The Rationale of Hell in Islam - Bassam Zawadi

the subject of hell is growingly becoming an uncomfortable one for several people muslims included it doesn't only trouble many laymen but it has also posed an intellectual challenge to philosophers and theologians from different backgrounds for centuries the the magnitude of the problem of hell varies from person to person and this in turn has spurned a whole host of different competing conceptions of hell is it is hell a place of physical suffering or simply mental suffering or or both uh is it a place reserved only for the for the worst of worldly criminals such as rapists and and and murderers or do people who refuse to believe in a certain religion also become its occupants is the punishment of hell permanent or is it only temporary etc you know uh in this age of globalization and and more personal interactions with with people from different religious backgrounds many muslims understandably struggle with this topic as it's not merely some intellectually challenging theological predicament one is struggling to rationally grapple with but but an emotional and personal one as well many of us have non-muslim neighbors childhood friends workplace acquaintances even non-muslim family members and relatives and yet our own faith teaches that there are those who match the descriptions and traits of the people dear to us that would be going to hell forever if they did not embrace islam uh undoubtedly this you know that that is a very unpleasant thing to to know and believe and the more one dwells upon the subject the more intense the clash becomes between one's emotional sentiments and beliefs and ultimately one either learns how to correctly harmonize between the two or falsely allows one of the two to to dominate and and subdue the other all done at the expense of reaching a balanced and emotionally healthy and and intellectually honest stance on the subject in this lecture my primary goal inshallah will be more focused on tackling this subject rationally um i i already have a lecture called uh deconstructing religious religious pluralism deconstructing religious pluralism on youtube uh which you may be interested in checking out as it's closely related to this subject and i don't plan on repeating most of what i've already said there in this lecture however i specifically wish to address the most common and central objections to the notion of hell i will seek to defend the idea that there is no that there is no logical contradiction in the notion of an all-good all-merciful and all-just god punishing people in hell forever for holding wrong religious beliefs so yes i'll be going the whole nine yards and defending the islamic orthodox stance concerning the subject uh i will not be resorting to this growingly weak and quite frankly desperate appeal to the idea that islam teaches that the punishment of hell is temporary nor will i be resorting to a growingly popular modern escapist tactic of illegitimately uh over extending the scope of who qualifies to be considered amongst the fetra you know where whereby we become extremely lacks when it comes to the excuses afforded to non-muslims who willingly choose to reject islam i don't promise that you'll emotionally like everything that i have to say in this talk but i feel confident inshallah that on purely intellectual grounds alone that you'd you'd be forced to at least rationally grapple and contend with the arguments and ideas that i'll be laying out especially since they have been tried and tested in the philosophical literature and have withstood the scrutinous test of time before i start a couple of things need to first be said about emotions as in uh you know as an epistemological tool or or utility of knowledge i don't want to spend too much time on this because i'm confident that the bulk of you listening to this are wary and intelligent enough to know that our mere feelings alone do not necessarily serve as good let alone definitive proofs regarding how we should perceive the morality of something um sure i mean sometimes it could for example let's say let's say everyone around the world feels absolutely morally repulsed about a certain thing that could be a pretty good argument for the moral abhorrence of that thing especially if there is no shred of evidence to counter that shared universal sentiment towards that thing however when it comes to emotional sentiments we need to be careful and ensure we distinguish between moral repulsion and natural distaste you know we may as allah says uh have a natural distaste for fighting you but that doesn't mean that we have an inherent moral repulsion against fighting per se for our intellect does inform us that fighting is sometimes morally good and even necessary yet we may not like the bloodshed and violent aspects of fighting but that does not necessitate that we equally and concurrently deem them to be morally blameworthy we we also need to distinguish between moral repulsion and and emotional endurance for example one one may not emotionally endure watching an animal getting slaughtered for food the person is too squeamish perhaps or or maybe the individual is worried he or she would get nightmares or whatever reason there may be that alone does not entail that the person deems animal slaughter to be morally objectionable and you know in fact the same person may happily gobble down the the meat of the slaughtered animal for dinner um you know similarly allah states in the quran that that that that the punishment that punishment for fornicators is uh a hundred lashes and uh you know right right after that he says and do not do not let your pity for them make you compromise the dean of allah by failing to enforce the law of allah if you believe in allah and and the last day and uh you know quranic exegetes such as imam al-qurtobi here have said that that natural emotions such as pity even for sinners such as fornicators isn't what is haram here rather what is haram is if those emotions get too carried away in swaying you to disobey the commands of allah you know for instance we may acknowledge we may acknowledge and be fully comfortable with the idea that some criminals deserve to be executed yet we can't stomach witnessing the actual execution it's too emotionally overbearing for many of us and that's completely natural and okay as long as that doesn't wrongly influence our moral judgments about the matter you know what what you can or cannot stomach is not a yardstick for what is deemed to be moral you know um you know imagine witnessing all those people dying in the flood during prophet nooh islam's time or or during the earthquake during prophet sallahu salam's time uh or when the brimstone fell on the people of lut i mean most of us would not relish in actually watching these people die in this manner nevertheless we recognize as muslims that these punishments are historically real and just and hell is no different many of us may not bear seeing or imagining anyone in hell but for allah it's easy it's easy i mean you know he says you know it's it's easy for allah to to to put people in hell but we are not allo no dada so so the point i'm trying to make is that we need to be self cognizant of the various levels of our emotions i'm not arguing that we shouldn't get emotional about the subject of hell i mean for you know it it is after all an emotionally taxing topic uh on the contrary having a strong emotional reaction when engaging with the topic of hell is not only understandable but but a sign of iman it's a sign that you're not merely deeming hell to be some abstract and intellectual exercise that you're simply philosophizing about uh you know that there there's a hadith that uh that states that the that the angel mika il ali salam stopped laughing ever since hell was created i mean this is a distressing subject and we should obviously be very concerned uh about ourselves and and our loved ones you know we should we should be filled with all sorts of emotions when when engaging with this extremely critical subject you know we must not be uh emotionally indifferent to it um so what i'll be contending what i'll be contending is that we shouldn't be feeling morally repulsed about the idea of hell specific specifically the islamic conception of it obviously i'm a muslim and i'm not setting out to argue on behalf of all conceptions of hell out there uh so uh kind of kind of similar to the problem of evil uh i will be arguing that the challenge posed by the uh by the problem of hell is is is in fact more emotional uh rather than logical and um you know with that said uh i'll be making a a conscious effort to avoid uh using emotionally laden rhetoric in this talk uh you know uh i was hesitant and still am hesitant about this approach uh out of fear and concern that i overly uh academize and intellectualize the topic of hell um as as sheikh sultan you know a professor of uh theology at um university said in one of his lectures there is a concern of overly academizing subjects such as such as hell and the punishment of the grave and the day of judgment etc to to the point where we are lacking in taqwa and or or god fearing sentimental reactions we should be having in response when these topics are brought up um however at the same time there are certain settings where this approach is called for and and since i'm primarily setting out to contribute to a to a fartkithaya or or an islamic communal obligation of addressing objections to this islamic doctrine i'll have to primarily resort to engaging with this topic rationally thus it's incumbent uh you know on all listeners to not only listen to this lecture on the subject of hell but but to listen to other heart softener lectures out there uh in in in in order to strike and attain that intellectual and and spiritual balance now with that said uh i i'd first like to spend some time highlighting the the conception of hell uh that i'll be defending uh the the first point the first point uh is that hell is a retributive punishment hell is a retributive punishment a retributive punishment for failing to accept the religion of islam without a valid excuse according to the criteria laid out by allah now when we say retributive punishment as you know as in contrast to um a reformative punishment we mean that the primary purpose of hell as a punishment for disbelief isn't to isn't to reform and purify the kafir but but rather to serve as a just penalty for the crime of kufur it is a punish it is a a punishment that is deserved and merited meaning it is intrinsically fitting that those who died upon disbelief uh incur such a punishment the the the underlying purpose of retributive punishments is to restore moral order so to speak uh you know what i mean when when a crime is committed against somebody the the person who committed the crime undermined and and devalued the victim um and and for moral order to be to be restored the criminal must face a consequence that exhibits and and demonstrates to everybody that what he did was wrong and and that consequence must be in the form of a punishment or penalty that adequately and and fairly reflects the severity and extent of the crime uh that was committed and and offset it for for justice to be to be restored um uh that that very restoration of moral order and an affirmation of the value of justice is a praiseworthy thing to be pursued in and of itself it is inherently the right thing to do and thus aspire towards actualizing you know regardless of any consequences such as whether the criminal is reformed or not um you know thus hell as a punishment for disbelief is is not primarily meant to have consequentialist outcomes such as the rehabilitation of the kafir or or to merely serve as some kind of deterrence or or any other purpose but is rather a punishment that that is that is meted out against those who are worthy of it and and and is uh you know who are deserving of it sorry and and and is done to to to satisfy the demands of justice you know the justice being retributive not not not restorative um punishing people for the crime of kufur with hell is not ultimately remedial in its intent and effect but but rather justice serving um again i'm i'm specifically speaking about hell applied as a punishment against kufar for the crime of kufur not not muslim sinners who who may enter hell temporarily um now in theory in theory a a punishment could serve two benefits simultaneously you know namely uh enacting retributive justice and and seeking to to rehabilitate the criminal um you know even in human administrations of justice we we seek to protect society from criminals uh maintain social order uh deter people from engaging in criminal acts um and and and helping criminals uh you know uh rehabilitate and and reintegrate back into society um all those consequential motives of the criminal justice system you know are well recognized i mean there's no issue there but to say that restorative or consequentialist driven justice is the only or even primary goal of justice is problematic because if that were the case then it's possible to achieve those objectives by meeting out what we would all find to be disproportionate punishments uh to to people so for example let's say that the punishment for rape is that the rapist pays the victim 90 of all his money for the rest of his life one could try to argue that this is a pretty good deterrent from committing rape but most of us would argue that even if it is a good deterrent it's not just because a financial penalty even a really hefty one doesn't suffice for punishing people who commit the extremely serious and disgusting crime of rape you know the physical and mental harm inflicted upon the rape victim cannot be justly accounted for merely through the implementation of a financial penalty on the flip side however you know one may argue that the punishment for a rapist could be could be castration and and brutal non-stop torture brutal non-stop torture for 10 years non-stop now we could all agree that this is a very strong deterrent but is it truly just and proportionate as a punishment or is it over the top um you know let let's take another example i mean let's let's think of of jaywalking i mean let's say that the fine for jaywalking is 500 us dollars most would argue that this seems pretty fair however is it really a strong deterrent for a billionaire hardly but but at the same time do we really believe it's fair and just to find billionaires hundreds of millions of dollars for jaywalking simply because we believe that that it would be an effective deterrent discouraging jaywa uh you know discouraging uh billionaires from jaywalking um as much as many of us may not like many of the billionaires out there i think we'd all agree that this wouldn't really be just even to them um now why why am i bringing all this up i'm bringing this up to make clear the fact that that that punishments and penalties do not only factor consequences into the equation punishments and penalties must be deserving and and proportionate to the crime committed um they must be inherently just and not be sheerly consequentialist driven uh in their intended goals um you know and and the punishment of hell in in islam um you know it is no different when it comes to punishing people for for their kufur right i mean you know allah says about the people in hell you know you know are you recompensed except for what you used to do you're being recompensed you're getting what you deserve for what you used to do you know in other words hell is your just and do punishment now let's go over let's go over some textual proofs demonstrating that the punishment of hell is everlasting for for kuffar here's a hadith from sahih muslim where the prophet peace be upon him is reported to have said allah would admit the inmates of paradise into paradise and the inmates of hell into hell then the announcer would stand between them and say oh inmates a paradise there is no death for you o inmates of hell there is no death for you you would live forever therein um another another hadith clarifies that this statement made by the caller is is made after after death itself is symbolically slaughtered um in hadith we read that the prophet peace be upon him said when the people of paradise have entered paradise and the people of the fire have entered the fire death will be brought and will be placed between the fire and paradise and then it will be slaughtered and a call will be made o people of paradise no more death o people of the fire no more death so the people of paradise will have happiness added to their previous happiness and the people of the fire will have sorrow added to their previous sorrow so reading these hadith together we see that it is clearly established that both the people of paradise and people of hell will never die why because the very notion of human death itself has been brought to an end it's not a conditional statement that says that that the people of hell will not die only as long as they are in hell but perhaps hell's existence itself is temporary and so the people of hell would perish along with it as well no rather since the very notion of human death itself has been brought to an end there will be no death for those people period otherwise the bringing of the end of death itself as stated in the hadith would make no sense now someone may try to say well okay the the people of hell won't be annihilated fine um they will live forever granted but but maybe they will leave hell one day and and enter paradise and and when the prophet peace be upon him said that they will live forever um uh in in hell um perhaps he met just a really long time uh for the people of hell um keeping aside you know keeping keeping the very stretched reading of this hadith aside you know allah states very clearly um in in in 40 that that the people of hell will never enter paradise he says surely those who receive our revelations with denial and arrogance the gates of heaven will not be opened for them nor will they enter paradise until a camel passes through the eye of a needle this is how we recompense the wicked now in this ayah allah is saying that they will only enter paradise you know he said that they will enter paradise only until a camel passes through the eye of a needle in other words absolutely never why well since a camel is obviously too big to pass through the tiny eye of a needle that clearly suggests that that it will never happen and this is reinforced by allah's words in surat al-baqarah ayah 167 the misled followers will cry if only we could have a second chance we would disown them as they disowned us and so allah will make them remorseful of their misdeeds and they will never be able to leave the fire so the people of hell will will one never die two never enter paradise and three never leave the fire three explicit statements when brought together leaves us with one clear conclusion namely that the flood of hell will remain in hell endlessly um um another proof is a very lengthy hadith in sahih al-bukhari it's it's concerning the intercession of the prophet peace be upon him for for the dwellers of hell in in in the afterlife uh in the hadith uh uh it is mentioned that the prophet peace be upon him will keep coming back and and interceding um uh and until uh after he does so for the fourth time he says he says no one remains in hell but those whom the quran has imprisoned and those who have been destined to an obligatory everlasting stay in hell so yeah and and imam al-bukhari said that that the statement of the prophet peace be upon him but but those whom the quran has imprisoned refers to the statement of allah in the quran and and qatad said that this necessitates everlastingness um so so so the hadith is clear that the prophet himself the prophet peace be upon him himself understood the quran to be teaching that there are those who are mahboo soon or or imprisoned in hell who would not would not get out even after he exhausted his efforts at intercession and and that hulud or or everlastingness was was their ultimate was their ultimate fate um moreover allah states regarding the disbelievers in suratud uh ayah 16 it is they who will have nothing in the in the hereafter except the fire their efforts in this life will be fruitless and their deeds will be useless um also in sort of aya 121 it is they who will have hell as their abode and they will find no escape from it um yeah you know so pretty pretty clear ayah it's not it's not saying that they will have both uh you know hellfire and paradise uh but rather uh only only the hellfire so we have established that not only will the people of hell never die you know just thus disproving the idea that islam teaches annihilationism the the idea that people that the people of hell will be exterminated permanently from from existence somewhere down the line we've also demonstrated that they will never enter paradise either and well they must be alive somewhere and that that somewhere uh that somewhere is is hell um now let's let's touch upon the subject of of morality of beliefs um when when thinking of morality and ethics uh many tend to think of actions in speech rather than beliefs detached from actions in speech so you know you'll find many people saying things like you know hey i don't care what you believe you know as long as you don't harm others through your actions and words you know i'm totally fine with that or you know or something something to that effect um but how about mere beliefs themselves could could simply having a wrong belief about something uh even if not expressed or acted upon be morally praiseworthy or blameworthy um doesn't human intuition tend to value speech and actions more than mere beliefs of an individual and if that is the case then why would a sinful muslim who merely has a correct belief about god be better than a very generous kind and loving non-muslim who happens to hold a faulty belief about god um okay so let's first tackle the issue of whether whether beliefs could be inherently immoral in and of themselves one thing to consider right from the top is that is that beliefs form the basis for actions of speech let's say for example that there is somebody who is completely and unconditionally against the use of modern medicine and as a result of this withholds necessary medical treatment from their extremely um um you know uh he holds uh he withholds necessary medical treatment from from his extremely ill children you know who die as a consequence of this withdrawal given that the belief itself [Music] given that the belief itself is the primary cause of the harmful action it becomes difficult not to condemn the belief along with the action as well now let me clarify something this is not to say this is not to say that any belief that has the potential to cause harm is worthy of condemnation because some beliefs are restrained by others right so so for example if one merely held the belief that he opposes you know modern medicine and favors alternative medicine yet yet in an emergency situation he is willing to compromise at a sheer necessity to opt for modern medicine then that's completely different this is not the same thing as mentioned in the example i gave where the person's beliefs are that modern medicine are to be avoided completely and unconditionally even if it results in death and and and as shown that that belief in and of itself is morally blameworthy and and one who adopts that belief unjustifiably is likewise morally blameworthy so so as we saw one correlation between beliefs and actions is that beliefs form the basis for actions thus you can't just say that only harmful actions should be condemned while completely neglecting to to also denounce the harmful beliefs that incited those those harmful actions however another correlation between the two is that actions themselves could result in the adoption of beliefs um in other words beliefs could be a consequence of actions uh so let you know for example let's let's say that a marketer or or a salesperson who works for a tobacco company um willfully ignores all scientific research pointing to the harmful effects of of cigarette smoking and and thus in in order to ease his conscience and continue working for the tobacco company he adopts the false belief that smoking isn't that harmful or or let's say that a doctor intentionally ignores all the medical research that demonstrates that prescribing a certain drug is is ill-advised just so that he could continue prescribing it and and earn an extravagant commission um thus for for for financial gain for a financial gain both the marketer at the tobacco company and the doctor willfully adopt willfully adopt false beliefs in order to continue selling harmful products these false beliefs were a result of an action namely the action of neglect neglecting to know the truth neglecting to research and be open to the possibility that they may be doing something wrong and similarly like in the previous modern medicine example we can condemn those we can condemn those adopting these false beliefs because these false beliefs were formed as a result of immoral actions namely purposeful unwillingness to to know the truth take another example let's say let's say somebody spread false rumors about about you and your character you know he he he slandered you and and let's say that the people he spread them to believed what he said about you without questioning or or or seeking to ascertain the veracity of what he said nevertheless to their to their credit they didn't they didn't conduct any immoral action towards you based on those rumors nor did they spread those rumors they they merely and only believed the rumors now the question is can we hold them morally accountable for merely believing the rumors well many would argue yes and and and as islam states we need to have hasn't you know or benefit of the doubt and ensure we are cautious about blindly believing such unstep uh such unsubstantiated things about people or or let's say somebody holds racist beliefs yet never acted in a in a racist fashion against anybody never uttered a racial slur never oppressed anyone on the basis of his race wouldn't we still consider that person to be morally blameworthy simply on account of holding such racist beliefs most of us would we we believe that the the that the person morally speaking ought to not hold these beliefs that the person should know better um he you know he should know better not to hold these beliefs about other people or um or let's say somebody is a sadist who believes it's okay to take pleasure in the suffering and torture of even innocent people he doesn't believe that's okay to actually torture innocent people but believes it's okay to enjoy watching the the the torture of innocent people um he harms no one he doesn't even publicly say he's rejoicing in the suffering of others he's not even paying money to access these torture videos he keeps this belief to himself and does not encourage others to torture people but but surely surely we can still recognize that merely holding such sadistic beliefs is in and of itself morally and ethically wrong now now having established having established that mere beliefs alone detached from actions in speech could be subject to moral assessment and evaluation we can now turn to the question are our beliefs about god subject to moral appraisal is merely holding beliefs about god morally blameworthy now we said that the beliefs we said that beliefs could form the basis for actions and we presented some examples you know uh you know showing how how how wrong beliefs uh uh you know uh could result in in in wrong actions similarly holding a false belief about god could result in wrong actions such as shirk you know which is a grave crime as it entails violating allah's soul right to worship i'll expound more after a while inshallah as to why shirk is is so evil uh of a crime um um you know um uh holding holding a false belief about god could also result in in rejecting the mandates of god that he revealed through the the correct revelation it could also result in having a flawed moral compass rooted in a false moral standard that has no divine stamp of approval from allah you know i mean such such a faulty belief could drive us to have a faulty understanding of of the nature of our relationship to god you know are we god's servants or are we his friends are we or are we his spiritual children or or all of these things or or some of these things or none of these things having wrong beliefs about god could end up situating us in a manner that incurs his wrath and displeasure um you know thus holding sound beliefs about god is a moral requirement as it serves as being a necessary precondition that enables us to correctly fulfill our obligations towards him so in a nutshell can our beliefs alone be subject to moral evaluation and and assessment is it sometimes critically important to have correct beliefs in order to be morally upright the answer is a clear yes but you know one may insist one may insist that we've got it all wrong that what is actually subject to moral evaluation is not the belief itself but rather how the belief was attained or retained in other words we don't pass moral judgments on beliefs themselves but rather on the belief formation process so the doctor who kept prescribing the harmful drug isn't to be blamed for merely falsely believing that the harmful drug is good but rather for why and how he continued to believe that the harmful drug is good namely for financial gain and dishonest ignorance of the truth similarly these people these people raising this objection would say that that holding a wrong belief about god isn't the problem but rather why and and how people hold these false beliefs could be the problem so so for example if if a person intentionally and knowingly rejec rejects the true religion of god then yes he is to be condemned but if the person follows a false religion while being sincere in thinking that it's true then he cannot be blamed for it why because the belief formation process itself is commendable so you know for as long as the person was sincere in choosing what he believed to be true about god then we cannot fault that person now what does islam say about this does does it teach that sincere kuffar are necessarily um excused um i have argued in a separate lecture uh you know which you can find on youtube called uh deconstructing religious pluralism which i just which i mentioned mentioned earlier that that this is not the case i've shown how the quran itself doesn't simply excuse kufar on account of their sincerity alone i will not i will not rehash that here for the sake of saving time as as this lecture is already going to turn out to be very lengthy as it is um you know one may refer to that lecture for the textual proofs but for now i'm going to be assuming that islam does not teach that allah excuses disbelief in islam merely on account of sincerity so is this problematic should people be morally excused simply on account of their sincerity well i think that with just a little contemplation we could see that this isn't something intuitive you know there are people who sincerely believe very disturbing things and we don't excuse them for it i mean think of anything you hate it could be could be racism zionism colonialism misogyny islamophobia etc i mean there are sincere advocates of these isms and beliefs that you know the the idea that they all get some blanket excuse for for merely being sincere in their convictions doesn't really sit well with most of us most of us recognize that people can be blamed people can be blamed for putting themselves in a situation where they have ended up being duped albeit sincerely into adopting morally unacceptable beliefs inshallah i will be expounding more on this sincerity objection later in the lecture but one may object by saying that people don't choose their beliefs you know that people don't choose their beliefs that that you know there's no on and off switch for believing what we do you know we we do not we do not control our beliefs in the same way we control our limbs you know i i can choose in an instant to to to raise my arm up but but i can't do the same with my beliefs i can't just choose to believe something so isn't it unfair for god to punish someone with hell for something he cannot control okay um several com comments are are in order here um we we we need to differentiate between having direct control over our beliefs and indirect control over our beliefs direct control over our belief would be something like believing at the snap of my finger that the sky is in fact green not blue yet most of us would agree that we generally speaking do not have that kind of control over our beliefs you can't just believe something like that at will nevertheless there there are cases or examples that could be furnished demonstrating that we that we could have direct control over our beliefs um you know how sometimes we say things like i want to believe this is true or you know today i'm choosing to believe in myself in my capabilities or or a friend tells you i know this doesn't make sense but i really need you to believe me right now and you say okay i'll believe you and and so on right so we have we cut we kind of have this idea of choosing to believe things um some some examples to consider here would would involve when you have a stake in the truth of something um i mean take for example somebody who's trapped in a well in the middle of nowhere you know he he chooses to believe he chooses to believe because he wants to believe that he'll be rescued he's not basing this on any evidence rather he wants to believe he'll be rescued because if he doesn't that alternative outcome would be too grim for him to handle and would only demoralize him so in order to not feel panicked and depressed and in order to feel optimistic he chooses to believe that that he will be rescued um at other times we may knowingly suppress information and believe to the contrary of what that information is conveying um uh you know some people are willingly in denial about certain things you know they intentionally refuse to allow themselves to believe something um imagine imagine a mother who has a child who she knows deep down inside is using drugs when she's outside the house she she knows that if she chooses to believe that he's doing drugs then her relationship with him would crumble but but out of love and for the sake of having a healthy relationship with her son she chooses to suppress that information and and uh and and willingly believe that her son isn't doing drugs um just in order to maintain that healthy relationship with her son this this is psychologically possible we can also imagine choosing to believe things out of pragmatism or or uh uh or or convenience for example an employee working at a company could see that the work environment is is really horrible but in order to cope better and motivate himself to pull through going to work each day he manages to convince himself and and believe that his workplace environment isn't actually that bad we could also imagine someone choosing to believe in something in in order to ease his conscience you know imagine somebody um did something really bad and he's feeling very guilty about it um that the guilt is just eating him up alive well in order to make himself feel better he begins to convince himself that what he actually did wasn't so bad after all and and and he does this by trying to modify his his previous moral stance on that matter more examples can be offered by hope the gist of what i'm trying to get at is clear to say that we do not have direct control over our beliefs is not clearly unconditionally true at least several human experiences do seem to lay testament to that you know some sometimes sometimes we consciously choose to believe things in people not because the evidence was so powerful enough to to compel us to believe you know kind of like how we are compelled to believe that one plus one equals two as there's no escaping having that knowledge but but rather choose to believe out of love or out of maintaining relationships or out of optimism or out of mercy or out of psychological need or out of our mental and spiritual well-being out of saving our marital relationships etc whoever makes that blanket unconditional claim that we do not have direct control over our beliefs at all would need to provide um some evidence for that secondly even if we grant that we do not have direct control over our our beliefs we most certainly do have indirect control uh over our beliefs uh you know this is this is hardly disputed and virtually every philosopher would agree with this so for example i could choose i could choose to research and better investigate a topic or i could choose to neglect doing so and it's pretty obvious that researching and knowing more about a given topic could play in if in an influential role could play an influential role in shaping my views and opinions about that given subject um you know another way we have indirect control over our beliefs is that we can choose to put ourselves in in in situations and circumstances that that demotivate and hinder our ability to change our beliefs you know i mean perhaps living in a living in a particular environment or or working in a particular job or befriending or marrying particular people would make it increasingly difficult for us to change our beliefs yet many are willingly putting him putting themselves in those situations or at the very least willingly remaining in in such circumstances some some who object to the notion of hell argue that it's easier said than done for people to change their circumstances that it's not always psychologically or physically easy to make decisions requiring significant transformational changes now there's no denying there could be cases like that however we have to be careful about being too lacks on people by by affording them excuses that they do not deserve you know it's easy to say that one isn't responsible for what he has no control over but what if that lack of control only came about as a consequence of irresponsible voluntary past decisions that were made let's say let's say a father has no money and isn't able to feed his family um some may say come on he isn't able to feed his family and you can't criticize him you know it's not like he has the ability to do so but refuses but then we say okay hold on why is the father in that situation is it because he lost his job due to an economic crisis that was beyond his control and there was no one to help him or was it because he recklessly gambled all his money down the drain and is left broke as a result of that with with with his family bearing the consequences as well there's a big difference right or or let's say you have a you have a heavily drunk person who cannot control himself while he's driving really fast and and he shout at him to stop on the side of the road but he's unable to and and he recklessly swerves hits the pavement and and injures everybody in the car now technically he could say in his defense that he had no control at the time he shouted at him to stop that he didn't willingly injure everybody in the car however we all know that he is still to blame because he did have the ability and control to avoid knowingly getting heavily drunk with the intention to drive later similarly i mean let's say you have somebody who who works for a criminal organization right um you know and as a member of this criminal organization he has no choice but to torture innocent people he really has no choice however he did willingly join that criminal organization and he does willingly remain in it but as long as he as he's part of it he's forced to torture innocent people can we not blame him for willingly putting himself in a situation where he's coerced to torture people absolutely of course we can same thing when it comes to our character i mean let's say somebody has really serious anger issues do we excuse him because he cannot control his anger well how about when he's calm and collected and he's fully aware that he has serious anger issues did he not have the ability to take anger management classes or at the very least research on google tips on how to self contain one's anger sure he did but he chose not to he chose to be okay with having serious anger issues even at the expense of continuing to emotionally or possibly even physically harming people as a result of his extreme anger we have to understand that we indirectly have control and influence over our psychological and spiritual conditions over the course of time you know just as you can take courses to to harness your logic to better avoid committing logical fallacies and and just as you can um influence your weight through through dieting and exercising and and and you know and just as you could take uh training courses to develop soft skills like negotiating and and and management you can also influence the formation and development of your character and spiritual state over time you know each time you resist to sin you strengthen and train your will to resist for the future as well the more you resist to sin the easier it becomes to resist again and again many of us can choose our friends can choose our circumstances can choose several factors that influences you know several factors that influence our decisions somewhere down the line you know the more you squander away opportunities to do good and opt for chances to do bad the more accustomed you would become to engaging in this you know it could reach the point where there's no turning back even you may even reach a point where you freely you where you freely commit evil actions till you reach a threshold where there's no coming out of it and that's where allah prevents guidance for some people and seals their hearts kind of similar to a drug addict who who keeps taking drugs till he until he reaches a point of uncontrollable addiction yet it was free will that gradually led that person into that state of lack of control it's no different coming bringing trying to relate this all to the topic now right it's no different with beliefs and searching for religious truth there may be people who intentionally make themselves ignorant of things they are morally obligated to know in in the name of some ignorance is bliss attitude or or heedlessness or whatever reason so it's not a simple matter of saying well we can't blame that person for being a kafir because you know he was ignorant but why was he ignorant why was he ignorant is his ignorance a result of previous immoral and reckless decision-making which led to it or not it's important that this is addressed you know as ignorance isn't always morally blameless as we've already clearly shown um you know i mean i mean let's say a racist juror let's say a racist juror believed that the black defendant was guilty even before the trial began he couldn't help but believe it he's a racist who's been indoctrinated to have such prejudicial beliefs about black people you can't just tell him at that point in time to just stop believing in such a prejudicial fashion and in an instant he just stops it's beyond his control and we can't judge a person for things beyond their control right wrong you know as that person as that person had a lifetime of opportunity to critically question those racist beliefs of his and you know before before he was chosen to be part of the jury for that trial similarly when people are not angel are not able to change their beliefs at a given point in time we must ask why and ask whether reckless decision making and and carelessness and indifference to the truth led to that lack of control or not you know it's important to understand that moments moments of decision making are not single precise moments there is a whole lifetime of decision making that influences and and shapes our characters and beliefs you know every moral and spiritual decision that we've ever made over the passage of time plays a role in constituting who we are today you know now now with with all that said with with all that said we you know we can better we can better understand why it could be under people's control to choose kufri beliefs about allah i mean you know after all allah does command the disbelievers he does command the disbelievers to believe in him and his messenger you know i mean someone might read this arya and say how can someone be commanded to just believe well you know as we just saw it's very reasonable to understand how in fact one could control what he or she believes now since we established that it's that it's possible to to understand how people can control their beliefs what does islam say about the blameworthiness of people who fail to believe in the correct religion it's important to understand that there is a direct correlation between one's role and one's obligations all right so you know there is a direct correlation between one's role and one's obligations you see a doctor a doctor by virtue of his role as a doctor has an obligation to know the best treatment for his patients likewise a teacher by virtue of him being a teacher has an obligation to know how to best teach his students similarly a parent has an obligation to know how to raise his children and so on right i mean so you know similarly human human beings have have a role to play by virtue of them being human free agents when it when it comes to knowing how to acknowledge how to acknowledge and serve god we we already discussed we already discussed the importance of having correct beliefs about god you know if one believes in god if one believes in god as the vast majority of people do then he then and one then one would want to find out what god has to say about the purpose of our lives how to treat people you know whether they're salvation whether whether whether uh god is pleased with us or not whether we are indebted to god for for our existence etc it's to do it's the duty of man to find out what his duties are it's the duty of man to find out what his duties are there there's a lot at stake here and and the more there's a stake in something the more the more crucial it is that we have correct beliefs concerning that thing now but based on what we said earlier about belief control we could imagine we can imagine there are people who who willingly choose to blindly stick to their religion in in in order to maintain relationships with their with their families and friends as they feel that converting to islam may compromise their their familial ties you know there are those who willingly stick to their kuffur um out of love for their tradition um you know the people could be kuffar because they're not willing to investigate the truth claims of other religions they choose not to it could be out of indifference or unjustified misplaced con over you know misplaced over confidence in their current faith regardless a decision was made to not expose themselves to evidence for islam which which they could evaluate you know it was under their control whether to inquire further or not about religious truth claims but they willingly refuse to do so um you know there there there are those who willingly reject islam for for a host of reasons but the point is that it's conceivable for us to imagine that people could willingly choose to believe something even if evidence per se isn't playing a role in in their decision making secondly secondly people could be fought because they didn't take the duty of of of religious inquiry seriously enough you know it's it's diff it's difficult it's difficult to offer an objective precise standard of what constitutes sufficient religious invest investigation but perhaps one useful method would be to compare would be to compare investigative standards each respective person typically applies to other matters for example buying or selling a house um uh or investing a good portion of your money in stocks or or choosing a spouse or or uh relocating to a new country or or quitting your job etc you know we should contrast how much research and and and and how factual people are when making decisions about some of the most important matters in their lives with their research into finding out what the true religion is if they've devoted if someone's devoted far less time to investigating religious truth then then say deciding which new car to buy then that says something about how important that person deems inquiry of religious truth to be and yes as a result that person could be held morally culpable for carelessness and holding wrong religious beliefs and that that person that person would not be justified in thinking he's justified in holding the beliefs that he does um you know or or or contrast how one spends his free time spending hundreds if not thousands of hours watching movies and playing video games uh you know compared to dedicating time to contemplating about his purpose in life right you know uh those who took their religion lightly and and as a game and and were and were deluded were deluded by the dunya now back to islam's perspective islam teaches that that allah's guidance is a is a key factor in in both becoming guided to islam and remaining guided in islam right you know also says you know what you know it's not for a soul to be able to to to have iman except by allah's permission you know islam does not teach that that accountable people have full control over their beliefs but but only that they have sufficient control to the point where they could be held accountable for their beliefs you know you cannot will something unless allah wills it now allah's guidance does not entail does not entail him forcibly making one believe rather for for allah to guide a person that person must himself will to believe right you know i mean woman whoever wills to believe let them believe and whoever wills to disbelieve let them disbelieve um right you know you know whoever whoever strives in our cause or or path we shall guide them you know is only a reminder so over wills so whoever wills will pay heed to it you know and there are several other ayat to that effect so so allah guides guides those who who truly wish to seek the truth who truly wish to seek the truth you know guidance guidance from as as clarified by the involves making the truth clearer to the person and and easing and facilitating the path to to acquiring the truth you know it it it also involves um allah giving the individual that inner strength to accept the truth in the face of obstacles you know we can understand allah's guidance as as him actualizing circumstances to to enable people to make correct decisions in their religious inquiry you know where he enables their their motivations to be to be further inclined to to seeking the truth um you know we need to understand something here with you know who are the people that are accountable in islam um you know they are those whom the message of islam has reached and are intellectually capable of understanding it and engaging in the required um process of reflecting upon it and and suppo and subsequently either accepting or rejecting it without any serious threat to their well-being um they they must be able to engage in contemplation about the message of islam you know which would then serve uh you know which would then possibly serve um you know as a causal stimulus to them embracing it you know so i mean the the critical contemplation or or reflection process um you know what would involve mental questions you know such as whether there are good reasons for for for me to embrace islam you know have i properly understood what islam teaches and what commitments and and sacrifices am i required to make when i convert to it etc you know and um just as just as we have control just as we have control over our weight by by forming intentions to exercise and and eat fewer calories there is also that control to believe things that control to believe things by forming intentions uh to reflect upon them and as and as said earlier allah islam teaches that allah would assist that process of reflection and embracement of the truth if the will to seek the truth is truly there if it's truly there so so the control that the human being has is the intention to engage in serious reflective inquiry of religious truth while the final result involving discovering the truth and and embracing it with its settlement in in the heart is by the guiding a that is by the guiding aid of allah you know um allah can allah can enable and assist the person to to have correct desires and and inclinations to to seek the truth and and resist temptations and obstacles that may hinder one's journey to seeking the truth but but there must be that higher intention that that higher order desire to to to truly seek the truth and and then the lower order desires become incline become aligned with that higher order desire through allah's help um what are higher and and and lower order desires um okay uh please pay very careful attention um you know if you're multitasking while listening to me that's totally fine but you'd probably just want to stop for five minutes because what i'm going to say right now may may sound complicated but but but it really isn't and and you know if you just re pay really close attention you then you you'd easily get it the first time inshallah right and and uh you know there's a point that i'm gonna be making an important point it'll be making uh you know uh by saying all this so i don't want you thinking that i'm blabbing on or philosophizing uh uh needlessly right now um so um so what what are what are higher and lower order desires all right so higher or second order desires are our desires our desires to have certain desires okay so for example an example of a higher order desire is um i desire to desire eating healthy foods so so not only do i want to eat healthy foods but i also want to enjoy and crave healthy foods so basically you want to have the feeling of wanting something and not merely just wanting something the lower order or first order desire is simply i desire to eat healthy foods now now it's easy it's easy for lower order desires to get influenced and manipulated if they're not strongly aligned with a higher order desire in other words if you don't truly want to desire and crave healthy foods then your desire for healthy foods is more prone to health to alter under under pressure and temptation similarly the same logic works when it comes to seeking religious guidance you know i mean the the the the the prophet you know he taught us to make uh you know certain kinds of dua you know like for example one of them is um you know right so you know oh allah i ask you for firmness and and consistency in this affair meaning meaning the ability to to constantly practice and be committed to the dean and and i ask you for for the determination for the determination to follow the right path so so here you can see that the dua involves invoking allah to help us have the correct lower order desires namely continuously wanting to be consistent in following the deen right you know another dot we make is you know you know oh allah make our hearts um um firm firm upon this deen you know again you know merely making this dua out of sincerity is is an indication that there is a higher order desire to want to follow the dean of allah you know that the making of the dua is a reflection of a desire of desiring firmness upon the deen of allah right you know you know another popular um make iman beloved to us and and adorn our hearts with it and and and make detestable to us and and fisk and and disobedience and and and make and make us among those who are who are guided and upright you know again this dua is a dua to allah to help us have the correct lower order desires we don't merely wish to have iman but rather wish to always want a man by loving it to desire to to desire to have the desire of hating kufur and whatever displeases allah all right um you know there's also another dua you know you know oh allah help me to remember you and and thank you and and worship you in a beautiful manner i mean this this is a beautiful dua you know you're basically saying when you're making this dua oh allah i want to want to remember you i want to want to thank you i i want to want to worship you in a beautiful manner the very fact that you're making all these kinds of duas sincerely is indicative of the fact that you have a higher order desire to want to have the lower order desires of remembering and thanking and worshipping allah you making the dua sincerely to want to love iman is proof that you want to want to love a man so you have that higher order desire you know the the there there there are people whom allah guides these are the people these are the people whom uh whom allah guides they are the people who have the right sincere higher order wills and desires allah will make things easier for them by strengthening their willpower to have the correct lower order desires to align with and conform to those higher order desires in in order to please them in in in order to please him you will not stop wanting to commit xena unless you sincerely want to want to stop committing zinna and this goes for every other sin including the worst one you keep committing a sin and you say you know my willpower is too weak i can't overcome my desires i can't stop committing zina okay a sincere question to you do you really wish that your desire for zina comes to an end ask yourself that now now at this point you might be asking why on earth is bassam getting too philosophical about this and and just complicating things look the point i'm essentially trying to make in the context of allah guiding a non-believer to islam is that the non-believer must have a higher order desire to want to accept the truth at all costs to truly want to submit to god even if it means conceding that he was wrong about his religious views all along you know even if it means having to change his moral paradigm um even if it means um upsetting his family and friends even if it means drastically changing his lifestyle and if that higher order desire is truly there then allah would enable that individual by strengthening his will power and guiding his desires to take the measures necessary to acquire the truth of islam allah would enable him to want to undergo his research correctly and in an unbiased fashion allah would assist him by emboldening him and instilling courage in him to want to confront his family and friends about the new deen he has embraced in other words allah would guide him by helping him correct his lower order desires this is the main point i wanted to reach and i and i and i apologize if i have over complicated this but but i really wanted to find a way to make it clear that allah's guidance involves guiding our desires and will but that doesn't occur unless we have a higher desire for that divine guidance to occur so so the free will is there because having that higher order desire is from us but the correction of our lower order desires is by allah's assistance thus this helps us understand how divine intervention does not compromise our free will again apologies if i have over complicated this um uh but it's really not that complicated and and in case you didn't fully grasp what i said i'd recommend you rewind and and and listen to what i said again until you get it i'm i'm confident that you will um uh yeah so sorry he expands his breast to islam you know allah knows best who to guide and who to condemn to help right you know you know and we know who is most deserving of of of burning in hell you don't know you don't know allah knows he knows what each person was you know he knows what each person was capable of doing and not doing um he he knows how many uh opportunities were wasted to traverse the path of guidance he knows what the true underlying motives of each individual were um he knows how heedless and sincere each person was you don't know he knows you know alexander states that he wouldn't bear people burdens that they are not able to bear right right and um you know on the day of judgment on the day of judgment those who do enter hell will concede that they were wrong and are worthy of blame they won't be kicking and screaming that god was unfair to them but rather that it was their fault you know if we if if only we had listened or used our intellect we wouldn't have been from not from amongst the people of the fire they they failed they failed to act to they failed to actualize their their intellects capacity to seeking god and and they acted irrationally by by satisfying their short-term desires at the expense of the longer term um you know they they failed they failed to use their reason to to to regulate their passions and desires you know you know we've been heedless of this and in fact we were oppressors you know or or you know how we regret being heedless about the about the day of judgment you know there are several quranic there are several quranic um references uh alluding to this admission of guilt and regret by the kuffar in the afterlife their own limbs their own limbs would testify against them on that day you know all the evidence against them will be laid out that day every opportunity forgone to research about religious truth um every moment they decided to follow their desires every instance they they elevated their ego and found it beneath them to submit to moral dictates that didn't align with their predetermined standards of morality all the evidence will be laid bare against them on the day of judgment and they will not be able to refute it nor would they be able to make a case that they are being unfairly judged and once we understand this and and fully appreciate the justice and fairness underlying the notion of allah guiding and misguiding people then many of the objections that are raised automatically lose their force with that said let's try to let's try to let's try to get back to the subject of punishing kuffar with everlasting hell one objection raised against the idea of punishing kuffar endlessly in hell is that if you take the worst muslim or or let's say um the the the least best muslim okay so let's say you know you take the least best muslim who doesn't spend forever in hell and compare him to the least worst cather who occupies hell for eternity then the difference between these two people should be significant enough to warrant the infinite difference in treatment between them so imagine that you have this horrible muslim guilty of the worst of sins who who only has a mustard seed of iman compared to somebody like abu talib the prophet peace be upon him uncle who who helped the prophet so much by by lovingly supporting his upbringing and and standing up for him and and and protecting him from the hostile quraish that that mistreated him for that mistreated him for for for preaching islam well how is it that this awful muslim is treated infinitely differently than abu talib why does that tiny miniscule mustard seed of iman have such infinite ramifications in terms of one's everlasting destiny is the least best person in paradise that much different than the least worst person in hell one thing to bear in mind is that there are degrees of reward and punishment in in heaven and hell uh respectively you know the prophet peace be upon him said that there are a a a hundred levels a hundred levels in in general with with the oh sorry hit my mic sorry about that um um uh you said that there are there there are a a hundred levels in jenna uh with uh ferdaus being the highest level um similarly there there there are uh degrees in hell you know i mean the the monotheism the the hypocrites are are in the lowest levels of hell right so you know and other people of hell receive punishments that are that are lesser in in gravity um uh you know a number of such as uh and and and even you know they they've said that that the scholars have differed the scholars have differed over whether the good deeds committed by the kuffar in this life could benefit them in the afterlife by by having their punishment reduced so so their good works can never help them in getting their kuffur and shirk forgiven and then consequently you know have them shifted to paradise out of hell however there is a difference of opinion that their good works could assist in the reduction of the intensity of their punishment in hell so not all kuffar are treated equally by being punished with the same level of intense harshness in hell um however the the the the the the the critic may insist that that the difference between the least best muslim and and the least worst kafir is eternity itself you know you know as the least worst kafir still endures everlasting punishment um um yes the the the least best muslim may suffer for a lengthy period in hell but but he he eventually comes out so how could the difference between the least best muslim and least worst kafir which may only amount to a miniscule mustard seed of iman have such infinitely profound differences in the the critic may ask isn't this a borderline case where where the difference between the least best muslim and the least worst cathode is so small to the point of not even being visibly identifiable you know that the manner in which they are both treated lacks proportionality how could something barely visible to the naked eye like a mustard seed of iman be so morally significant with such with such ramifications well i think that a number of points are in order here first firstly um something something could be morally significant even if it's cut-off point cannot be precisely determined or or visible to the naked eye for example what's the precise fine line between being generous and greedy in a given context or or between being pragmatic and calculating and and being a coward in the context of war or or any kind of confrontation um or you know between being reckless and being brave etc so even though we cannot always clearly know the precise cutoff point delineating virtuous traits such as generosity and bravery from from flawed traits you know such as cowardice and and recklessness the fact does remain that these cutoff points are morally significant because you know we do care about striving for for virtuosity and and abstaining from the adoption of defective character traits and and by virtue of logical necessity there has to be a cut off point somewhere even if we can't see it or precisely point to it we know it's there and we know it matters secondly we frequently deal in our daily lives with with borderline cases right so i mean a student who's whose gpa score is just minutely higher than someone else's you know get gets accepted into the better university um or or someone whose job resume is just minutely better than another candidates gets the job or or or someone whose work performance is is just minutely better gets get get gets the job promotion or or a salary hike etc and all these consequences have significant long-term effects and and we don't claim that people are being treated unfairly you know we recognize that there needs to be cutoff points at some stage now one may object and say that us human beings have cut off points for for things such as university admission and job promotions because we have to you know we have limited capacities and resources and so sheer necessity forces us to make these fine delineations between people however god isn't constricted in the same manner you know he has limitless power and is capable of accommodating people without discriminating against them with such tight boundaries spacing them apart however that response that response may work against the job promotion and and gpa score examples i gave but it doesn't work with the character traits examples that i've shown earlier um you know we we've we've seen that sharp cutoff points could exist in a meaningfully morally significant way just by virtue of necessity you know i mean the the existence of these cut-off points is not contingent upon anything that they necessarily exist there there necessarily has to be a point where one stops being honest and starts becoming a liar in certain circumstances and the difference between honesty and dishonesty is morally significant you know despite there being a miniscule fine line between the two um and despite us perhaps not always being able to identify those cut off points but we know that in reality they exist even if we may differ about how how to how to how to identify them um but the critic may still insist that that you know even if even if a mustard seed of iman does exist out of necessity as being the demarcating line between kufrin iman that this mustard seed of iman is not so morally significant to the point of having everlasting implications for the cathode and the answer to that objection is to respond in turn by contending that the crime of kufr and shirk itself is the ultimate crime against allah you know allah sees it as a great or or oppression in in this now now understandably human notions of justice are are inseparable from human determinations of justice and and human determinations of justice are prone to error you know we may be good we may be good in judging outward behavior but we're not we're we are unable to see a host of other things you know such as the pr you know such as people's um intentions and motives and regrets and and all these constitute the true moral makeup of individuals similarly when it comes to kufrin we we may fail we may fail to see its true ugliness when we look at the least worst cathode or and even fail to appreciate the beauty and and moral worth and value of that mustard seed of iman that is too difficult to observe uh when we when we look at the the least best muslim sometimes human beings muslims included fail to appreciate the gravity of a sin they they aren't looking it they're they aren't looking at it the same way allah is you know um um you know for example said you said with your mouth what you had no knowledge of and and and assume it's something to be taken lightly while in fact it's extremely serious in the sight of allah and this applies to other sins as well you know as we all know consuming riba is one of the seven worst sins in islam imagine that imagine a respected banker actively engaging in all sorts of ribba promoting work wearing a nice suit living in a posh neighborhood driving a nice car actually being more sinful keeping all factors constant keeping all factors constant um than a thief or a prostitute do our societies today look at it that way is that something simple to digest for someone who's been inculcated socialized and brainwashed into accepting the moral standards of our societies today there must be a certain level of conscious willingness on our part to remember that allah is the ultimate moral standard and that we must strive and remind ourselves constantly that we need to view the world through the lens of the divine rather than purely through our limited human perspectives back to the topic at hand why is shirk so bad the the prophet peace be upon him is is reported in sahih al-bukhari you know he you know he asked one of his companions you know what is the biggest sin in the side of allah and and then the prophet said you know to set up rivals or or those equal unto allah though he is the one who created you and is essentially treating one in a manner that only allah subhanahu wa ta'ala must be treated the the very purpose of our creation is to worship allah and so to worship other than him is an inherent rejection of the very purpose of our being any act of worship should only be directed to him if it is directed to any other entity then such an act is great is gravely misplaced and the very definition of or or oppression in arabic is the situating of things out of their designated places now we don't say we don't say that allah is a victim a victim of the oppressive act of on the contrary no one here is being oppressed other than other than the mushrik himself you know as allah says you know you know they did not you know they did not wronged us but but you know rather they they only wronged themselves whoever does good deeds then it is for their own benefit and and whoever does evil it is their own loss your lord is never unjust to to his servants so just because allah you know allah's rights and an honor are being violated through the oppressive act of he is not some victim who is harmed in any way as a result but again why is it such a great act of oppression is why is shook such a great act of oppression especially to the one who engages in it makes an insightful comment he says that he says that oppression oppression impedes or or obstructs safety or security and guidance and shirk is absolute oppression because it absolutely obstructs obstructs one's safety from the wrath of allah and absolutely derails one off the path of guidance the person the person also oppresses himself through committing shirk by by situating himself in a manner of of utmost servitude because that's what worship is um you know to to a helpless dependent creature it's it's inherently humiliating and denigrating to be in that state even even if the mushrik fails to see it going back to the hadith the prophet peace be upon him said that that the worst sin in allah cites is to set up rivals or or or those equal unto allah though he is the one who created you okay so is so evil not only because worship is a right due to allah alone but but its ugliness is magnified its ugliness is magnified because the mushrik equalizes between allah who is the source of his existence with the creation that is unable to even create a fly he equalizes between allah who is the ultimate source of his sustenance with entities that can barely help themselves it's the pinnacle of ingratitude and treachery you know we we know that there are rights we know that there are rights owed to people by virtue of who they are you know be they our parents our spouses our children you know think think about a right think about a right you believe you're entitled to think about a right you believe you're entitled to you know what whether it's loyalty from your spouse or or respecting obedience from your children or you know or wages from your employer etc think about why you deserve those rights and then imagine that the right of worship to allah is just maximally greater than all that worship is an act that inherently entails the recognition of the maximally perfect being the direct worship to a being that is not maximally perfect is a travesty of rights of utmost proportion you know the the the proportionality of a punishment to a crime um or for a crime um factors into consideration just how significant the right being infringed upon is you know somebody trying to cut your hand off deserves to be punished more than somebody who tries to steal your money you know as your of your right your right to your limb is more established than to your money similarly the right the right that allah has to be worshipped alone is a right that is the logical necessary outcome of all his attributes combined it is the most significant right a maximally perfect being such as allah lays claim to and its infringement is the most serious crime that could be committed as a result but still there are those who would argue that the punishment of everlasting hell is disproportional to the crime of kufr they would argue that kuffar only lived for a finite amount of time and engaged in their kufur in a finite time frame similarly they would argue that that this temporary crime of kufur only has temporary effects or consequences you know they would say you know it's not like kofur has caused god to be angry and and and you know uh you know to be angry for for all of eternity um you know that they they they would also say um you know whatever happened to to the eye for an eye and and tooth for a tooth rule you know if if unrepentant and inexcusable kufur is a crime against god then shouldn't the kafir suffer no more than how much god has suffered okay so i mean a number of responses um you know first of all you know the whole eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth rule is one is the one that applies between human beings right it's not universally applicable across all ontological kinds of nature so so let's say a human being commits animal abuse and and damages the eye or or breaks the arm of a cat or dog most of us do not say that the human being in question is therefore deserving of having his arm broken now i know that there are some people who are overly passionate about about animal rights who might who might insist that animals and human beings should be treated equally but but the vast majority of people don't see it that way and so i'm not going to spend time arguing why human beings and animals aren't equal um the the the fact of the matter is that it is far from obvious and intuitive that the eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth rule is one that applies uh you know it you know it's far from obvious and intuitive that that this rule applies between uh the you know all different ontological beings you know and and if that is the case and if that is the case um then god has a divine ontological being that has an essence not shared by humans is not obviously subjected to the eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth rule along with human beings as well you know the one making that claim the one making that claim needs to offer evidence for that secondly um regarding the claim that kufur only has temporary effects because it was a crime committed during a finite period of time i'd like to say to the one raising this objection how do you know that like how how do you know i mean first of all first of all common sense common sense tells us that that that that the effects of actions could last much longer than the duration in which those actions were perpetrated a straightforward example is rape it can take a person a few minutes to rape somebody but the scars and emotional pain and hurt that follows those horrendous few minutes would would continue to affect the victim for much longer than a few minutes similarly when it comes to inexcusable and unrepentant kuffur how do you know that the effects of this kuffer aren't everlasting in the sense that allah will be forever you know will forever be angry at that crime i mean how do you know that who are you to say what god can be angry about for a limited or unlimited amount of time what if allah's anger at unrepentant unjustified shirk is so intense that it never dissipates and and and as a result of this perpetual unrelenting divine wrath the punishment would likewise be interminable for causing this endless anger how do you know that this cannot be the case i mean can you prove it like have you considered that that maybe your moral sensibilities are too feeble to fully grasp and and appreciate just how serious a crime like committed against someone as infinitely great as allah truly is however some some would insist that that god's judgments must at least resonate with us as as human beings though you know otherwise how could we appreciate his justice and that's fine but but that doesn't mean that all of judgments must you know must resonate with us instantly sometimes contemplation sound reasoning and and detachment from previously held beliefs and presuppositions are are required in order you know to to acquire a sound understanding and appreciation of god's judgments and that's what we're trying to do as we contemplate about about this subject thirdly you know it's important to consider it's important to consider not only the magnitude of the crime of shirk but also consider the maximal worth and and status of the one only god who has been offended against is maximally perfect or or or infinitely perfect in a qualitative way in a qualitative sense when we say that allah is maximally perfect we mean to say that he is that he's maximally quintessential in in all his attributes he you know he is maximally perfect in his generosity mercy justice power knowledge supremacy etc and and that upmost magnificence of his attributes makes him one with an infinitely qualitative status building upon that we could argue that guilt is proportional to the moral worth or status of the offended side in in other words the severity of a crime is not only determined by how bad the crime itself is but also determined by who is being offended so for example animal abuse is not at the same level of severity as human abuse why not well because the moral worth or or status or dignity of the human being as is at a higher level than that of the animal and so the crime committed against a human being would be worse even if the same exact crime were committed against the animal similarly seeing that god is a being [Applause] who is who is infinitely more worthy and and dignified and and greater than than any other being then the level of severity of a crime committed against god shouldn't be equalized with that committed against a human being and as a result the assessment of the seriousness of a crime committed against god shouldn't be subjected to human conceptions of justice that that that we are that we are ordinarily accustomed to now people who who advocate against the notion of an everlasting punishment hell raise some objections against this reasoning which i laid out you know the the argument that i just laid out um um is commonly known in the literature as the the status principle um um what one one um one argument that they pose is that those classical theologians and philosophers who who promoted the status principle argument were were affected by the by the feudal societies in which they lived so so basically they lived at a time where it was the norm to believe that a crime committed against a king or or even a noble was more serious than a crime committed against peasants in a lower social economic class and and had lower status but but you know today we've grown out of this kind of way of thinking and we are now more egalitarian and we don't make such distinctions anymore as we view all human life to be equal however um in response to that i'd say that what i've already said is not affected by this in any way um i did not say that because there are uh certain human lives more worthy than other human lives that we could then deduce from this that god is greater in status no rather i said that different ontological natures are different from one another compared to each other humans are more worthy than animals and animals are more worthy than plants etc and since god is not a human being and is a unique being due to his unique uh divine essence and is not like any of his creation it was thus contended that god's status is at a different level than than human beings so whether you believe all human beings are equal in worth or not makes no difference to this argument secondly and i don't want to spend any considerable considerable amount of time on this but you know as this is a separate subject but but i'd argue that it's not even that rationally obvious that all human lives are are of equal worth um you know i mean imagine a prophet of god was murdered imagine a prophet of god was murdered and then imagine that a criminal on death row who was fairly sentenced by a court of law to be executed was was was killed by another prisoner just five minutes before he was going to get executed anyways the prophet who was murdered is a human being the murdered death row inmate was a human being are both of their lives truly equal in every sense in this case are both murders equally horrid and morally blameworthy i mean keeping religious beliefs aside i'd argue that it's not that rationally obvious that that these two acts of murder are equally bad and and also for you know for some of you uh for some of you advanced listening to this lecture you you also know very well that in the books of we read how different laws of could be effectuated with a with a major component being considered the the status and and other demographic features of the victim um you know also one one should bear in mind that that believing that human lives are not equal doesn't necessitate that we mandate laws that treat human beings differently in those areas you know i mean sometimes the moral worth of different human beings may be interlinked with their inner state that is not visible and apparent to us you know thus to to issue laws primarily based on on factors invisible to us is not something so straightforward and advisable but again i don't wish to get into all that as it's not relevant to the success of the status principle argument but but just some just some food for thought um uh yeah another objection that is raised um against the status principle is that god is not infinite in a in a quantitative mathematical sense you know you can't quantify god mathematically and if that's the case why are you muslims going about quantifying the punishment of hell so that it lasts for an endless number of sequential years into the never ending never-ending future but again no one said that allah is is being quantified you know though those who say he's infinite simply mean that he is infinite in a qualitative sense infinitude in the quantitative sense in the quantitative sense is in reference to notions such as you know limitlessness unboundedness immeasurability etc however infinitude in a qualitative sense entails absoluteness um wholeness completeness independence perfection etc so when we say that god's attributes are infinite we mean that they are wholesome wholesome and complete in their utmost and maximal perfection not that god's attributes are being quantified sequentially and and endlessly but but but rather that god's perfection is ultimate in that there can be no being that is conceivably greater in in terms of its properties so when we say that allah is is infinitely great um and merciful and majestic and powerful etc we simply mean that no being can ever be it can can ever conceivably can can ever conceivably be greater than allah in terms of these attributes when we say that allah is infinite in his power we mean that he can do anything logically possible when you know when we say that he's infinite in his goodness we mean that he is completely good and and there's no shred of an evil trait uh in him so since is is maximally um um holy um majestic uh dignified honorable supreme great you know that would entail that would entail that his status as a moral being is infinite in a qualitative sense which renders the ultimate crime of shirk committed against him to be maximal as well and that qualitative maximal punishment may very well be a quantitative endless sequence of epochs of suffering in hell as it so happens to be the most befitting and in uh you know the most befitting punishment and in uh in an infinite qualitative sense um again we aren't arguing that that god is infinite in a quantitative sense but rather that the fitting maximal and infinite qualitative punishment in this specific regard just so happens to be quantifiable in the form of an endless sequence of time in hell into the future um another objection states that that punishments should only take into account that the amount of harm caused to the victim or offended party and since god cannot be harmed direct offenses against him shouldn't be punished you know let alone end us endlessly the problem with that reasoning is that it's not true let's say you find out that somebody tried to kill you and and you weren't even aware that he was trying to kill you his plans to kill you got disrupted by the police and they arrested him before he was even able to get close to you um you weren't harmed one bit uh you know neither emotionally nor physically does that mean that the person who tried to kill you doesn't deserve to be punished i mean actually deserve to be punished for his attempt to kill you now that he should be locked up merely so that you stay safe but rather that he deserves to be punished for the intention and the actions he took in his attempt to kill you despite you not being harmed at all in the entire process yes of course he deserves to be punished so to say that punishments should only factor into consideration the amount of harm actually done isn't correct secondly saying that allah cannot be harmed does not mean that he cannot become angry when his rights are being violated in an attempt to undermine his honor and majesty you know it doesn't mean that he does not punish those who negligently failed to appropriately exemplify their subservience to him even though he's in no need of it god is a unique case in that one can can commit an offense against him despite him uh you know never being never being able to be harmed uh by that offense um you know yet the fact remains yet the fact remains that the offense was committed and that offense still needs to be accounted for and addressed in the name of justice and fairness another objection that is raised is that is that it's presumptuous on our part to assume that god is infinitely greater than human beings some critics would object you know by demanding to know the rational proof for that well before answering that we could first ask ourselves what properties do humans have which make them more morally worthy than than animals and insects well there are a number of distinguishing properties that we could consider here i mean one for example is is moral excellence human beings are our moral agents who govern and abide by moral codes you know they they have the ability to moralize and and and uphold ethical values and principles animals on the other hand aren't moral agents at that sophisticated level um you know another property is is um cognitive or intellectual ability you know we recognize that the ability to rationalize is an inherently worthy and valuable property to have um you know a another another property to consider here is power um not power in the sense of of physical strength because quite obviously several animals um you know such as lions and bears could could could easily overpower human beings individually however power here is is more to do with with it with effecting change in the world you know and that and that ability is strongly interlinked with and supported by other properties that human beings have you know such as knowledge and rationality etc so so looking at some of these properties which we intuitively recognized to be intrinsically valuable we could see why humankind as an ontological class of being is superior to animals now one may dispute one may dispute that these specific properties um um are the properties that that make us superior to animals right you know one may dispute this that's fine but the fact remains that the vast majority of us do recognize that human beings are inherently superior and and um you know uh uh you know you know we're inherently you know more you know were inherently superior to and and more morally worthy in status than than animals and and whatever positive properties human beings have that make them superior to animals then then know that god's positive properties are infinitely greater than human beings you know god is infinitely greater than us and moral excellence knowledge power etc um you know also consider um self-sufficiency or or or or independence as a property you know it's hardly deniable it's hardly deniable that this is a positive attribute to have well allah is infinitely self-sufficient you know not not only not only does he not depend on anyone but all living things depend upon him for their continued existence and sustenance even if a even if a potential infinite number of things continued to pop into existence god would remain the object of dependence for them there's no limit to how much one could depend on allah and thus there's this infinitely qualitative trait of dependability that we could also ascribe to allah as you know he is and as a result of allah being infinitely greater in status than us due to these maximally perfect attributes he likewise is infinite in in terms of his holiness you know he is you know he's infinite in terms of his honor he's al-majid he and is the source of all honor and dignity and and and so when the ultimate crime of shirk is committed against allah the seriousness of the offense must in some way reflect his his me his infinite majestic status that the crime must be considered maximally serious maximally grievous the kind of guilt at play here is maximal in nature as well and as the infinite worthy god that he is allah would have a regard for his own honor especially when his sole right to be worshipped alone has been violated unjustifiably therefore the guilt and liability that is carried with this offense must be of infinite severity you know in in in in order to to proclaim and reaffirm the infinite worth and majesty of of of allah and you know to commit such a treacherous crime to commit such a treacherous crime against he who is infinitely dependable is tantamount to an act of infinite ungratefulness and treachery and to make it known that such offenses against allah are of a nature incomparable to offenses we are typically familiar with and since the punishment must be maximal one possible form of that maximal punishment is everlasting hell now i'm not going to go as far as saying i'm not going to go as far as saying that the punishment for unrepentant and and inexcusable shirk must be everlasting hell i'm not going to make that claim i don't need to over burden myself trying to prove that rather it only suffices to demonstrate that it's logically sound and defensible for the punishment to be everlasting hell i don't need to argue that everlasting hell is the only adequate punishment that allah could have used to to justify uh you know you know could have used to justly uh punish people for for kufur all i need to do is show that we could rationally defend everlasting hell as an adequate punishment for committing kofur i don't need to go beyond that and and i believe i believe that the status principle is a logically sound and rationally valid argument demonstrating why at the very least it's logically possible for god to meet out everlasting hell as a punishment for the ultimate crime of committed against him and that's all that needs to be demonstrated in in order to debunk the argument criticizing the notion of everlasting hell as a punishment for for disbelief another objection states that you cannot measure the worth of a being simply by looking at its properties you know it is a human being who is mentally incapacitated and and cannot use his his cognitive faculties less worthy of a human being that who you know who isn't or or how about a baby who still isn't rational is that is that baby less worthy than a than a rational and intellectual adult human being whose rational faculties are more developed okay so you know this is thinking about this the wrong way um you know obviously obviously there are human beings who are more intelligent than others and more pious and morally upright than others etc you know but but but that doesn't mean that we start measuring the inherent worth of human beings based on this you know we we only appealed to these properties in order to demonstrate in order to demonstrate that human beings as in as an ontological class or as a or as a nature of being are superior as a as a class of species um and are in essence su superior to to animals and so any member of that class by virtue of belonging to that ontological class becomes superior in nature by default to any member belonging to an inferior ontological class of being in other words a one day a one day old human infant is inherently more worthy than a than a dog who lived for 15 years with cherished memories with his loving um human caretakers you know um since since human infants are are the outcome of the of the sacred procreative process of human beings that are superior to animals that they by default also inherit and attain that moral that superior moral worth now look there's nothing stopping anybody from coming along and saying you know what i disagree you know i i don't think human being i don't think human beings are superior to animals um you know you can't you can't appeal to biological features such as the intellect of a certain species and say that makes them inherently superior to another species you know you have no definitive rational proof that that human babies are more worthy than than cats and dogs who lived with their with their loving owners for more than a decade etc etc and and and you know what on purely rational grounds alone it's not that it's not that easy to intellectually completely dominate such people you know it it it is for this very reason that allah has sent down revelation you know we we can't we can't suffice on definitively knowing everything that's right and wrong um based on our rationality alone um again um i'll repeat myself the the only thing i've been trying to demonstrate here is that everlasting hell as a punishment could be rationally defended that that that there is no definitive rational argument against it and and as long as the muslim has good reasons for believing that islam is true any speculative argument against the notion of everlasting hell should not prompt muslims to have doubts about islam okay um let's move on to a new objection uh that appeals to god's attributes of love and mercy which go something like this if god is all-loving and all-merciful does that not entail that he loves everybody and is merciful to everybody and if so how can we reconcile that with god sending those whom he loves and is merciful to to hell and some people who who raise these objections say things like um you know i wouldn't even wish eternal hell on my worst enemy but but how can i be more merciful than god uh or you know or you know if i knew somebody was gonna walk into a burning building i'd use my power to stop them because that's the loving and and merciful thing to do yet you the muslim believes that god doesn't do that this despite him being uh infinitely perfect in his attributes that makes no sense um okay so you know in addressing this objection let's first talk about the the the attribute of love now islam does not teach that allah loves everybody unconditionally on the contrary allah's love is very much conditional allah's love is too precious to be directed to anybody unconditionally um you know what what allah does is is offer his love to to to everybody uh in the form of islam you know by having sent the prophet muhammad peace be upon him as a mercy to the worlds and and only those who accept and love the prophet muhammad peace be upon him would count as those who have accepted allah's offer of love and will then in turn be loved by allah himself you know so allah commands the prophet uh prophet sallallahu alaihi sallam to you know to say to the people you know you know say oh muhammad you know to the people you know if you love allah then follow me so that allah may love you you know so so allah loves and hates allah loves and hates and hell is one of the manifestations of allah's hatred just as paradise is one of the ma is one of the manifestations of allah's love paradise and hell are the outcomes of our relationship to allah this is what islam teaches now now those of you who are familiar with muslim and christian debates may be aware that several christian apologists try to criticize islam for teaching that god doesn't love everybody unconditionally you know including disbelievers whom he sends whom he sends off to hell um and and muslim apologists um you know have already pretty much responded to this argument uh so i'm not going to go off on a tangent here by responding to that argument you know those of you who are who are interested can go and search for those responses however for the purpose of this talk um i'm just going to simply say that muslims do not share the burden that that many christians have uh in in trying to reconcile between how god can love somebody and simultaneously send that somebody to hell for eternity um you know muslims from the get-go dismiss the presupposition that god loves everybody unconditionally now regarding allah being all merciful again does that mean that allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will be unconditionally and completely merciful to everybody surely that's not the case you know otherwise how can we affirm that allah is also uh you know the the old just who who can punish people for their sins i mean we can't we can't isolate allah's attributes at the expense of others uh you know as was stated earlier will not place anybody in hell unless they had a fair opportunity to make decisions that would have placed them on the right course toward the path of guidance um allah does does not owe us salvation he does not owe us salvation uh you know you know and had it not been for for for allah's grace and mercy upon you uh you he wouldn't have purified any of you but but allah purifies whom he wills um you know if if you say that allah must if you say that allah must take people out of hell at some point then now we aren't speaking about allah's mercy and grace anymore but but rather but rather his justice because you're now claiming that it's the kafir's right it's the kaffirs right to not be in hell forever um you know mercy mercy is the remission or or or forgiveness of a penalty that is already fair to apply you know otherwise if you want to insist if you want to insist that allah cannot punish people with everlasting hell then that means that you're appealing to his attribute of justice not not mercy and and we've already tackled earlier how how the punishment of everlasting hell could in fact be just and and and be a proportionate crime uh be a proportionate punishment to the crime of kuffur um you know so i mean to to say that to say that justice demands allah place us in paradise would be to transform what what ought to be his mercy into into duty for allah you know however allah does not owe us paradise for our words you know i mean yes our works are a reason for us entering paradise but we haven't earned paradise as a result of our works as if it's some as if it's some wage owed to us uh we we enter paradise primarily on the basis of allah's mercy the the very idea of mercy itself entails that allah has the prerogative of either granting it or not you know while whilst you know while not compromising any of his attributes um just just to elaborate on this point further um you know imagine imagine that there are imagine there are ten beggars on the street and and you know imagine there are ten beggars on the street you you as a as an individual person do not have a personal obligation to help any of them but but out of kindness and generosity you you decided to help three out of the ten beggars can the other seven beggars who you did not choose to help say that you were unfair for not helping them no they cannot why not it's because you had no obligation you had no personal obligation to help any of them the fact that you chose to help some of them was was due to your own willingness to be generous and kind to some of them you know it's not like you're an employer who who only decided to pay some of his employees their their their due wages rather these beggars had no rights over you in specific as an individual similarly if allah does decide to extend his grace and mercy to to to some people uh rather you know rather than others then you know this is not unjust on his part you know as people do not have rights over allah this is this is especially the case when allah himself has has already assured us that he doesn't let anyone carry a burden too too heavy for them to bear more moreover we need to understand that that allah's attributes of mercy and and you know of mercy and and wrath are are you know appropriately relational to that which is fitting which is fitting into these attributes it you know it it it depends on what allah has created a a rebellious satan is not deserving of allah of allah's mercy it's not fitting that he receives allah's mercy you know people who explicitly and and unrepentantly blaspheme god are not worthy of allah's mercy uh you know i mean to understand all merciful as as an attribute uh entailing that allah is completely merciful to everybody unconditionally is it is problematic you know i mean for allah to never unleash his wrath on on unrepentant criminals could in fact be said to not be loving and merciful to the victims who who do not obtain justice in this life so this idea of allah being unconditionally and completely merciful to everybody is quite frankly absurd and and regarding regarding this claim that you know uh you know am i you know i i wouldn't wish hell on someone therefore how can i be more merciful than god okay i mean first of all there are many things that you wouldn't wish on somebody but you know for a fact that god permits it okay i mean like take take evil in the world take evil in the world for example um you know that god has the power to stop evil and despite being all merciful he chooses not to and we as human beings wouldn't wish evil to to happen to others whom allah whom allah you know clearly allows evil to occur to um so it works the same way you know i mean mercy mercy as a human emotion could sometimes be a defect you know as it could taint our ability to be objectively good judges but but not with allah so so let's not compare ourselves uh to you know compare ourselves to him um consider consider the the famous hadith you know where allah allah says or in another version you know my my mercy precedes my wrath or or in another version my mercy my mercy overcomes my wrath um some muslims have mistakenly used this hadith to suggest that allah would not punish anyone in hell forever since it since it appears to them that allah in this hadith is claiming that ultimately his mercy would overcome his wrath in the sense that a time will come where where there will be no more punishment however this is a faulty a faulty understanding of the hadith and several have have offered reasonable plausible interpretations of this hadith um we we need to understand that that there are different dimensions to mercy you know there there is a uh especially when it comes to allah right so so there there is a generic dimension there is a generic dimension uh that that is applicable to both believers and non-believers and there's also the special kind of mercy namely salvific guidance to to attaining paradise and that is only specific to believers um you know when it comes to generic mercy um you know for example uh allah says in the quran that that he that he sent the prophet peace be upon him as a mercy to the world well you know right and the prophet peace be upon him he was sent he was sent to everybody um you know and you know rain rain is described as a as a form of mercy in the quran you know you know what woman and yourself and another and as we all know i mean rain comes down and and benefits you know both believers and disbelievers um you know there's also a hadith in um in sahih muslim where where the prophet peace be upon him said something to the effect that that that allah has 100 levels of mercy and he only sent down one of them to earth so that human beings and jinn and the jinn and animals and insects can be kind and merciful to one another so again no no distinction between believers and and non-believers here but but going back to the hadith you know what does it mean uh you know that what does it mean that allah's mercy overcomes or or precedes his wrath first you know notice the context of the hadith let me let me just read it out hold on yeah so uh it says reported god's messenger as saying when god completed the creation he wrote the following which is with him above the throne my mercy has taken precedence over my anger another version has another version says has has prevailed over my anger um so so you know this statement as we can see was was uttered after after allah completed the process of creation so it's not that he will say this in the afterlife on judgment day nothing like that so so it's worthy to to note the context um uh you know with this in mind you know one one one understanding of allah's statement is that is that allah's mercy is is much more vast than his punishment okay so his mercy is always constantly being bestowed upon us you know while his wrath is selective in terms of timing and in terms of whom he is unleashing his wrath against you know his his mercy has come to us without any preconditions and has literally preceded his wrath which is only unleashed later against us if we continuously sin and and fail to repent another interpretation another interpretation to consider is that the root word of overcome in the hadith is meant is meant to emphasize abundance you know in that his mercy is so much more manifested uh than his wrath uh you know in arabic we could say uh meaning that the individual's bravery was was more manifested um in other words his attribute of bravery dominated similarly allah's mercy is is more manifested and and exemplified than his wrath um another understanding is that allah's mercy precedes his wrath you know because because he began bestowing it upon us immediately once we were brought into into existence uh another way to understand the statement is that allah's wrath upon most of the kuffar for their you know for their kuffur happens in the afterlife you know their their kuffar does not prevent allah's generic mercy from being bestowed upon them in this life despite their kuffur and in that sense allah's mercy literally precedes his ultimate wrath for them so you know as we could see there's absolutely no reason why this hadith would even serve as as good proof for saying that hell cannot be everlasting especially when all these plausible uh you know alternative interpretations have not been shown to be less plausibly correct the next objection concerns what is known in the literature in the philosophical literature as uh the the the demographics of theism objection so basically it goes something like this um you know if you were born in saudi arabia you're more likely to be a muslim than if you were born in a uh religious hindu family in india or or religious christian family in the united states and so on um undoubtedly undoubtedly you know our our upbringing has an influence on us you know as we do tend to share the values and and beliefs of our parents and and clearly we did not choose the circumstances of our birth and being born into the right religion appears to give such people a a big advantage over others born into false religions you know those born into false religions appear to have many more barriers to overcome in order to attain salvation and so the objection goes that's not fair i mean god as you know those raising the objection would contend you know god should give everybody an equal opportunity at salvation a number of comments could be made here um so first of all god does not owe human beings equal levels of opportunity you know there's nothing about his attributes uh that necessitates us you know we need to stop we need to stop subjecting god to to our human moral standards we human beings typically give people equal chances of opportunity at a number of things even though there appear to be many exceptions but you know i don't i don't wish to digress let's let's assume that human beings always give other human beings equal chances at things as for god all that matters is that he is just and that justice is manifested by his promise that he will not bear people burdens that they cannot carry um it is his prerogative to give harder tests to people as he pleases i mean he is god after all uh the main thing to believe however is that he won't punish people for tests for failing tests you know they they they had no chance of passing moreover how do we really know that believers and non-believers aren't ultimately treated equally if you recall we said earlier that allah could and does intervene to help people become guided or or remain on the path of guidance as long as the higher order desire to truly want to acquire religious truth is there well perhaps allah's level of intervention to assist a truly sincere non-believer in a non-muslim land is greater in its extent than the divine intervention that he makes to keep a muslim living in a muslim land steadfast upon the deen in other words allah's level of divine intervention to guide people offsets the perceived apparent imbalance between people living in different circumstances and it also compensates for whatever extra barriers one may have to overcome in other words allah will give the optimal amount of guidance to each person in accordance with the level of difficulty um you know of their circumstances you know as long as they have the correct higher order desire to seek religious truth to truly seek religious truth so all in all things may very well equally balance out secondly um keeping aside the fact that there are converts to islam and apostates from islam and and how this observable fact serves as proof that it's possible to overcome demographic barriers it's it's widely common it's widely common to see people rebelling against their parents and rebelling against the traditions of their family wanting to be different and shifting away from their parents's old boring traditional norms and and seeking to be modern and open-minded i mean it's enough seeing the shifting trends in religious thought in in countries that were predominantly christian just a century ago and and are now becoming more anti-religious i mean i mean look at the rise and acceptance of lgbt and other radical shifts in sexual ethics for ex for for instance there's been so many wide ranging and and significant ideological and cultural shifts just in these two past generations alone so so so what we need to acknowledge here what we need to acknowledge here is that people clearly have it in them they have it in them to go against what their parents have have taught them they have it in them to look back at their upbringing and say i disagree with that i want to be different and that happens a lot especially as people get older and get exposed to different perspectives yet the problem is that most people unfortunately make awfully wrong decisions so this whole idea of people supposedly being born into embracing certain beliefs and customs and are psychologically unable to reject them is an argument that can only go so far there's no denying there's no denying that being born into a non-muslim family is a barrier and that being born into a practicing muslim family is is a gift and blessing from allah but the question is is that barrier is that barrier overcomeable that's the main question but someone may insist that if that same calf if that same disbeliever were to have been born into a muslim family then he would have died a muslim but again so what i mean as we said allah does not owe anybody anything similar to the beggars analogy that we gave earlier the only thing that suffices to say at this point is that as long as allah is not demanding something unbearable from an individual and and and punishing him on account of it then then the argument fumbles um and and by the way this is not withstanding and this is not withstanding um philosophical issues pertaining to uh to identity here i mean many would argue that that i bassam's awadi am am only bassam zawadi because i was born into a particular family in a particular time and place and and i am who i am because of all the experiences that i went through which shaped my personality thus it thus if my soul were to have been placed in a different body born under completely different circumstances then i wouldn't necessarily be bassam zawadi anymore you know i'd have a different name a different attitude different life experiences etc so to even talking i mean to even talk about us being the same people being born in different contexts has its own philosophical issues but but you know i'm not i'm not going to dwell on that um you know and again how far do we want to go with this with this argument um i mean and we sh shall we start excusing racist racists because they were born into racist families you know shall we start um excusing nazis because if you or i were born in in germany in the first half of the 20th century we might have ended up as nazis as well or or or how about how about we look at other demographic variables you know like like social class you know shall we now start making excuses for people who were who were born into rich materialistic families and and had more dunya temptations to to overcome and and as a result became heedless and forgetful of god and and the afterlife due to the many dunya distractions you know like you know should we say oh poor rich people you know they didn't choose to be born rich and and get distracted by all those temptations i mean you know i mean where where and when do the excuses end or or you know do we do do we do we do something more reasonable do we do something more reasonable and and tell ourselves hmm okay clearly these people born into into challenging circumstances have been brainwashed or attempted and and we we need to inform them that they are wrong we need to show them proof that they are wrong for holding the views that they hold you know we can understand and appreciate that if nobody tried to convey to them that they are wrong that that they may continue to hold the views that they do because that's what they were taught to believe however for them to continue holding on to their views even after being conveyed that they shouldn't subjects them to to just and fair rebuke and i'd contend that this is the attitude that we have for people believing any other negative thing so so why hold a different standard when it comes to false religions then um you know you know moreover if you know suppose suppose geography is is truly a barrier to someone with with the sincere higher order desire to to to seek and accept religious truth well i mean in that case a a person is expected to to exit to exert effort in migrating away from that land you know uh uh you know you know wasn't allah's earth vast enough so that you could migrate therein um you know also you know we we we can't we can't forget the role of satan in all of this i mean despite despite being resistable despite being resistable you know satan is one of the causal factors influencing people to make wrong decisions i mean many of us tend to forget the supernatural forces at play here and and only focus on searching for secular explanations for why people make the moral and spiritual decisions that they do you know such as one's geographical location of this birth i strongly believe at this that at this point you know that any further objections related to this argument would only arise out of a personal dislike for how god created the world with its with its division and distribution of barrier you know of this distribution of of believers and disbelievers you know um you know uh you know as opposed to you know there being a clear definitive argument for why god with the attributes that he has could or would not have created the world in this manner according to the quran people are kuffar for different reasons um some choose kufur out of out of love for sticking to their own traditions um some out of you know some choose you know out of following their desires or or you know or due to arrogance or or fear of losing dunya privileges or or due to inexcusable ignorance or or envy or or or distraction by materialistic pleasures or or or you know or apathy and and lack of caring to know the truth you know etc but again some people raise objections right um you know so you know they would say what about truth seeking people who do not convert to islam you know people who sincerely saw no reason to even consider islam as a serious option you know or or they died after trying to research islam with an open mind and heart yet failed to be pressed into converting to it and and the objective would go on to say you know um isn't how we believe more important than what we believe um you know is it isn't the kafir who has taken religious truth more seriously by by researching and contemplating about the different religious options out there better than a believing muslim who's quite careless about these issues and is only muslim because he was privileged enough to be born into a muslim family you know i mean didn't these kuffar have the correct higher order desires to be guided yet weren't guided i mean why why weren't these kuffar shown more evidence to to overwhelm them into accepting islam you know isn't there isn't there room to tolerate valid differences of opinion concerning religious truth are aren't muslims over cocky when it comes to how clear the evidence for islam is you know especially in an age where there are no more there are no more miracles being performed by prophets um you know not not everyone is capable of having access to the best islamic scholarship you know which which addresses arguments against islam and offers proof on behalf of it so so why should non-muslims who lack that access who who are good people suffer the consequences of that and going further with the objection you know how about people who have misunderstood islam you know and as a result of their misunderstanding have rejected islam can we can we even say that they truly rejected islam as as opposed to a mere caricature of it okay so let's let's let's address these inshallah um okay um first of all it's important to reiterate what has already been said namely that islam teaches that allah will not make anybody carry a burden that they cannot bear you know it is true that muslim theologians do differ with one another whether whether it's morally possible for allah to make somebody carry a burden that they cannot bear however they all agree regardless of whether it's possible or not that allah does not and will not make anybody endure a burden that they cannot bear secondly and as mentioned before we are in no position to comment on the sincerity of anybody allah says in the quran that he knows best who is worthy of his guidance just because you see somebody who outwardly appears to be researching um tirelessly for religious truth that doesn't mean that this is what is truly going on it could very well be the case that the person's motive is to sincerely find the best arguments for his currently held beliefs and to find holes in others because he's already made up his mind that he's right you know not not at a true sincere openness to seeking the truth thirdly thirdly you know as for who is truly a a good person you know you know uh you know who's a true true i mean who's a good person according to the standards of god you know and and not our personal standards that that is also something very difficult to pass judgment on um let me let me share a personal anecdote let me share a personal anecdote i i work in the corporate world okay um and and i once had a non-muslim manager who for all intents and purposes was a seemingly nice guy one time during ramadan you know my manager told me um you know bassam i'm i'm starving i haven't i haven't ian all day and and you know and then i jokingly said to him you know well you know wow i mean you you might as well just fast like the rest of us muslims sing sing it's the afternoon and you have you haven't eaten yet you know i was just joking with him right and um and then i went to the restroom and suddenly he came barging in while while i was washing my hands and he said to me with a visibly upset face and in a slightly harsh tone you know you that you know what bassam i don't have a problem with the idea of fasting what i have a problem with is being told by somebody to fast i don't like to be told such things and you know i was really i was really like god smacked to see him say that you know we never spoke about these issues at work i knew i knew he was an atheist but the way he said what he said in addition to what he said was just so eye-opening for me i mean i mean that here i thought was a humble hard-working man but but turned out to be somebody who who found it beneath him who found it beneath him to fast for an infinitely perfect god even if he didn't believe that god you know existed three weeks later he passed away he he had a stroke and if that incident didn't occur i probably would have been like oh poor guy you know he was such a good guy he would he was hard-working and committed to his job you know he was good to his colleagues you know he was very humble shame shame he didn't accept islam but but but this incident this incident which was totally totally unprompted made me view him differently and and you see the thing is this the thing is this most of us don't really get to see people for who they really are when it comes to these issues you know especially in this day and age where even talking about religion and politics is is highly discouraged in several contexts and environments you know and that ought to make us reflect you know we we ought to humble ourselves and admit that we don't really know who is truly sincere and who isn't let's trust in allah and and stop with the speculative assumptions fourthly fourthly regarding misunderstanding islam what do we mean exactly by misunderstanding islam no one has a flawless understanding of everything about islam you know even muslims can be mistaken about their understanding of certain issues about islam what concerns us is how important is the matter that has been misunderstood you know if if if someone misunderstood something about islam and that misunderstanding legitimizes and justifies his rejection of islam as a result then yes a cade a case could be made that he possibly deserves an excuse however if someone understands the core elements of islam yet misunderstand something about islam you know such as something pertaining to a moral issue for example uh an issue where it cannot be rationally demonstrated that you know or is rationally demonstrated to be impossible for god to have issued that moral mandate then rejecting islam on this basis alone may not be justified you know in in fact in fact the bulk of the excuses that we hear today from people concerning their rejection of islam stem from issues pertaining to morality whereby whereby if they perceive i mean correctly or otherwise whereby if they perceive islam to be teaching something that doesn't align with their already presupposed moral standards then then islam is worthy of rejection they they do so even if the if it cannot be demonstrated with with definitive rational proofs that god couldn't have legislated the mandates that they have rejected islam on account of so if the if the misunderstanding of the kafir is linked to an issue that does not legitimize rejecting islam for then the excuse for misunderstanding islam does not apply here it does not necessarily apply here so we need to be clear about this point so so if if someone for example if someone for example understands you know uh core islamic teachings properly yet he has a misunderstanding that islam supposedly teaches that that the husband has the right to take his wife's money forcibly and and he rejects islam simply based on that this is not a legitimate reason i mean even though islam doesn't teach that husbands have the right to take their wives money forcibly there's nothing that rationally indicates that it's impossible for allah to have legislated that if he's so willed thus even though this is a misunderstanding you know about some aspect of islam rejecting islam for this reason is not justified therefore we need to be careful in highlighting what are legitimate excuses and not you know and again let's be forthright here let's be forthright here i mean we see most people out there rejecting islam for several of its moral teachings that they clearly do understand but but because it doesn't align with their own moral standards standards which they cannot even prove to be true that they reject it and even when muslims do offer clarifications about several of these moral issues many of these clarifications involve secondary aspects regarding the issue not primary so so for example even if you clarify even if you clarify that the hudud are only implemented after strict preconditions were met the fact remains that the hadood are still open to being applied once the conditions have been fulfilled and several people still reject islam as supposedly being barbaric on account of it um you know i'm not i'm not saying i'm some ultimate authority here but but you know i'm speaking from you know from over 15 years of experience as an apologist here and believe me when i say that unless the critic of islam has an open mind about recognizing the fact that you can't demon that you cannot that you can't definitively prove that god couldn't legislate these mandates you the muslim are not going to succeed in convincing him to rationally and happily embrace all the moral legislations of islam and and and it's the critics resistance to accepting that fact and insistence on subjecting moral codes to his own personal unprovable moral standards that makes the critics rejection of islam unjustified fifthly and related to the previous point we we also need we we also need to consider people's excuses for misunderstanding islam's core teachings some some muslims some muslims say things like well you know when you have anti-islamic propaganda outlets like like fox news spreading all this misinformation about islam can you really blame non-muslims for having such a negative perception okay once again we we need to be a bit more a bit more nuanced here propaganda and the false spreading of rumors about islam and the prophet muhammad peace be upon him are as old as the inception of islam itself there were there were false there were false rumors concerning the prophet sallam you know during his lifetime you know of him being a a magician and a fortune teller and a poet etc yet those people those people exposed to that propaganda also had access to sources containing the truth it's not like they were living far off in distant lands away from any reasonable access to alternative sources of information you know that the kind of kuffar that imam al-ghazali speaks about in his faithful you know who could have legitimate excuses rather some people have decided to restrict themselves to particular avenues of information and rejected the other avenues much of the time without a sound and valid basis you know so so so going back to the whole fox new the whole fox news excuse don't these people have the ability to reach out to muslims and and speak to them by by visiting a masjid for example can they read the quran or perhaps go on the internet and speak to muslims you know or how about googling how how muslims respond to these allegations do they not know do they not know that different media outlets can say different things sure they do they are the very same people they are the very same people who complain about other news outlets and how they propagandize against their faith so on what basis did they decide that fox news is speaking the infallible truth about islam who forcibly shoved fox news propaganda down their throats should they really be left off the hook and not answer for why they willingly decided to restrict themselves to a particular source of information about islam you know we wouldn't excuse them if we were talking about other things such as racism and zionism yet when it comes to false religions some of us appear to be way too lat way too lacks when it comes to the excuses where we're willing to afford others and and that's problematic that's problematic you know allah says in the quran that that that in the afterlife many of those destined to hell rebuke those who brainwashed them you know kind of like those p people brainwashed by fox news and and the response of those people you know those who did the brainwashing like like those working at fox news is that they never had any power over them you know what one woman and then else states that both of them will be punished the brainwasher and the washed in other words you're not little children who can't think for themselves you you should be held accountable for what information you willingly decide to swallow and accept and sixthly sickly regarding this whole issue of more evidence why doesn't allah make the evidence for islam so convincing that everyone could become you know you know that everyone would be compelled to concede that that islam is true to the point that that whoever denies it would be equated to a flat earther who deserves to be deserved to be ridiculed by everybody well we we need to understand we need to understand that that iman is much more than mere belief or or or cognizance of certain facts about islam i mean even ibiza knows that islam is the true religion revealed by allah you know rather you know iman also entails embracing islam and you know we don't always embrace what we know to be true i mean one for example may know and believe that a certain law must be followed in the country he lives in yet yet he doesn't embrace or or wholeheartedly accept that law excuse me you know he may not embrace or or wholeheartedly accept that law iman however iman however requires embracing islam not not merely knowing that it's true you know um you know allah said you know if uh um and you know by allah you know they will never truly believe until they refer to you oh muhammad sallam until they refer to you for judgment in their disputes and and they find no internal resistance regarding your judgment and and completely submit to it we we know from reading the stories of the prophets in the quran that that many kuffar continued to persist in their kuffur despite being exposed to miracles and clear-cut proofs you know allah mentions in the quran that the disciples of isa alaihissalam asked for a table to be sent down from heaven so that it can serve as a as an undeniable proof that islam was truly a messenger of allah and allah obliged and and he sent down the table but with an extremely important condition attached and he said and whoever whoever disbelieves after this i will punish him with a punishment i will not punish anybody um you know and and that makes perfect sense i mean to be exposed to that level of evidence and still choose kufur just makes the kufur even more ugly and crude and so it could very well be in the best interests of mankind that the level of evidence for islam isn't compelling to that extent you know for for if mankind were to still be rebellious to to to god after that kind of evidence then then the punishment would just be worse you know you know we we need to understand that that kufur takes different forms you know is not only about having incorrect beliefs but also involves having the the wrong kind of response to allah you know i mean there you know there is the there is the kuffar of apathyism you know you know whereby people don't even care true or not they don't even care whether islam is the divine revelation of allah never even cared to research about any divine truth claims you know and and there's there's there's of of of rejection you know whereby people would reject islam regardless of whether it's true or not you know you know if um but rather the the oppressors reject allah signs you know that and and there's arrogance driven kofor you know kufril you know similar similar to uh iblis but but it's not unique to iblis i mean you even see it amongst people for example for example um the the popular um and an influential uh philosopher john stuart mill this is what he said pay attention he said i am informed that the world is ruled by a being whose attributes are infinite but that but but what they are but what they are we cannot learn except that the highest human morality does not sanction them convince me of this and i will hear my fate as i may but when i am told that i must believe this and at the same time call this being by the names which express and affirm the highest human morality i say in plain terms that i will not whatever power such a being may have over me there is one thing he shall not do he shall not compel me to worship him i will call no such being who is not what i mean when i apply that epithet to my fellow creatures and if such a being can sentence me to hell for not so calling him to hell i will go so you know people who who speak and and challenge god like that even out of sincerity are not worthy of guidance as it's very clear that their acceptance of god is conditioned upon god satisfying their own personal standards in other words they ultimately worship themselves even tells us that there are some kuffar not necessarily all but some who even after going through the experience of the day of judgment and and seeing hell would express their wish to go back for a second chance yet allah says that even if they did they would still go back to their old ways some expectedly struggle with this i mean how is this even possible how could someone go back to kufur after experiencing the day of judgment and and seeing hell it's because these kinds of kuffar committed kufur out of arrogance they didn't care about the truth at that moment at that moment as they as they witnessed hell they only verbally claimed that they would change their ways if they had a second chance it wasn't uttered out of sincerity or because they genuinely changed but rather only as a pragmatic attempt to evade immediate punishment kind of similar to to to to pharaoh you know who said i believe while while he was drowning he didn't genuinely embrace iman he just wanted to be saved at that point and for these kinds of people once you take them back to their comfort zone they forget whatever promises they made and and they go back to their old ways as their as their desires begin to revive and they begin to have false impressions that that that judgment day is too far away to be concerned about it even if they know it really exists is not granted to those who who commit sins to the point when death approaches they say i i've repented now no that that's not genuine amen that is based on acceptance and and embrace and sacrifice out of the out of love for the truth that god has revealed rather that's a superficial kind of repentance with the sole objective of of getting out of that immediate predicament such superficial repentance um was was directly linked to the distress that the person was feeling at the time and if so and and and so if the distress is gone then the desire to repent is gone as well but but if the repentance were genuine then it would be different so this whole idea of of having this in-your-face evidence for islam in this world is not going to achieve what we think it would the way allah allah has so arranged this world and the manner in which he manifests himself to this world is that his guidance is proportional to and reflective of the disposition of people's hearts in terms of their of their intention to desire full truthful submission to god and allah has promised that guidance for such people he he would intervene in a divine manner to enable the actualization of their being guided to islam so so at that point at that point we need to stop thinking purely in terms of naturalistic means of of how people can get guided to islam as as there are supernatural forces at play here you know and and if allah knew that there was any good in them he would have had them here and and if but but but but even if he did make them here they would have still turned away out of stubbornness and um several quranic exegetes here state that hearing hearing here refers to hearing the proofs of islam and understanding the message of islam better so allah due to his infinite knowledge knows that even if those if these kuffar were further exposed to better evidence for islam and were further exposed to teachings that better explained islam that they would still be stubborn and rejected and thus allah withheld that exposure to them but again this is allah speaking you know we as muslims cannot withhold better evidence for islam and better articulated teachings of islam as we do not know how how people would react but allah knows this this ayah is so important so important for the subject that we are discussing also interestingly enough i i've come across who have said that that the opposite is also true um they said that if someone were in the process of sincerely and truly and and correctly seeking religious truth but but died before he became a muslim that allah would forgive them you know uh i mean you know with the understanding being that that that allah knew that that if they were to continue living they would have continued on that path and eventually found islam you know because they were on the correct trajectory of religious inquiry and and being on the correct trajectory by necessity would lead eventually somewhere down the line to somebody to that somebody accepting islam um the the the level of evidence the level of evidence for islam that that allah has permitted to be accessible in the world is not is not simply there to satisfy people's intellectual curiosity islam prompts people to to consider it as a serious option that they must consider you know the the the clarity of its truth to an individual varies in accordance with their willingness to open their hearts to follow the truth at all costs the the evidence for islam is only a means to be used as a cause by allah to guide those whose hearts are truly seeking him you know it's it's it's coupled with with allah's uh supernatural intervention islam you know whoever allah wishes to guide he he expands their breast for islam this is important to understand this is important to understand if we ignore this point if we ignore this point and only think in terms of naturalistic epistemic means then we're going to continue we're going to continue facing intellectual difficulties with this subject we need to question we need to question whatever flawed expectations of what constitutes sufficient evidence and ask ourselves whether that even aligns with the purpose god set out for his creation allah has given us the freedom to choose to believe correctly and that freedom by necessity entails the possibility of making wrong decisions the freedom to choose guidance the freedom to choose guidance also involves the real chance of being misguided now you know some people would argue that sorry some people would argue that surely not all kuffar are the same i mean abu talib is not like abuja that's clear and and and islam acknowledges that you know some some openly blasphemed god and would go as far as saying that you know they don't even care about allah while other kuffar are not like that at all that that's fine we acknowledge that islam does teach islam does teach that that kuffar will be in different levels of hell you know with with the with the intensity and and severity of the punishment ranging ranging variously across those different levels so so even though the levels share something in common when it comes to duration namely being everlasting they still aren't exactly the same when it comes to severity um you know i mean you know uh you know as an analogy think of two two criminals think of two criminals sentenced to life in prison one criminal ends up in a mini in a minimum security prison while the other is locked up at a maximum security prison and does hard labor and is permanently in solitary confinement yes both of these criminals got life in prison but the severity of the punishment isn't the same so a similar kind of logic applies to hell um as well um lastly lastly you know sincerity sincerity is is but a single characteristic that a person has but when that characteristic when that characteristic is mixed with other features then the final cumulative result may not be a positive thing i mean many racists sincerely believe that their race is superior many zionists sincerely believe in their cause you know similarly many ultra nationalists sincerely believe that they can advocate for a brutal foreign policy if it serves their own country's interests etc so so so so when sincerity is tainted with such ugly views we stop to see sincerity at that point as a positive attribute why well because these people ought to know better it is expected of them to be better than this this kind of sincerity is an ugly and defective kind if if anything if anything it could be worse to be a sincere racist than a hesitant one who is unsure whether he should be a racist similarly due to the ugliness of shirk sincerity is tainted when it's coupled with it now with all that said with all that said yes islam does teach this notion of and and i've spoken in more detail about the fatra in my in my other lecture you know which i alluded to earlier entitled uh deconstructing religious pluralism and and and i won't be rehashing much of what of what i you know what was said there you know as i explained the different viewpoints um scholars have concerning um the the opinion that i personally take is that the al-fatrah are those who were truly seeking religious truth in this life and reasonably exhausted their their physical and intellectual capacities while doing so yet failed to become muslims and and and and we have to bear in mind that the excuses for the fatra you know as stated by by ibn and josiah um um you know could vary across time and place depending on time and place depending on time and place the excuses afforded to the fedra could and would vary moreover the the the fatra according to the opinion that i take um would be given a a special test on the day of judgment to to determine to determine their reception of the message of islam and and how they fare in their test would determine their their ultimate destinies now some may ask why would allah even create the i would submit i would submit that one of the wisdoms behind that is is is to remind us muslims not to have any excuses for avoiding giving dawah to remind muslims that that there really are people out there who are receptive to the message of islam and we shouldn't assume that all kuffar are hopelessly kuffar in fact the existence of fatra could be a liability on muslims who who may have to collectively answer for why they have failed to ensure the spreading of islam in an effective manner to every single person on the face of this earth so their very existence could serve as a test for muslims and and as a motivation for muslims to to to give da'wah so yes yes islam teaches this notion of but what i wanted to caution against what i wanted to caution against is overdoing it with the kinds of excuses we make for kuffar and as a result as a result unjustifiably unjustifiably over extend the scope of who truly qualifies to be classified under the fold of the fatra but now there's another objection that's raised how can somebody really choose hell nobody in their right mind would choose to go to hell i mean who in their right mind would want to burn in hell forever clearly the kuffar are sincere when they reject islam right allah has given human beings the the autonomy to make free decisions with with wide-ranging serious consequences you know he he allows people he allows people to choose their their ultimate fate and and destiny um you know our our personhood and and identity and uh are are shaped by who we are and the decisions that we make you know you know which we which ultimately shape and form our beliefs and characters if allah were to coerce or or manipulate us into into making us love and embrace and seek him then there isn't much of a test anymore but despite that free will despite that free will some insist that people still don't freely choose hell um you know i mean yes a drug addict for example um may willingly to may willingly choose to take a particular drug but but he didn't really choose and desire to become so addicted to it you know i mean yes a person may choose to eat lots of sugary sweets every day but he didn't really choose and and desire to to become obese so even though people may willingly choose to do an action that doesn't mean that they have chosen to accept its consequences and thus some allege that god is unjust for giving human beings the capacity to make such drastic decisions which you know which which affect their ultimate destiny they argue that human beings should not be given such a huge responsibility you know as a as as they are kind of comparable to children who shouldn't be left to make critical decisions pertaining to their lives you know even in the name of freedom of choice you know they argue that that even that even adult human beings cannot make effectively accurate choices pertaining to religious truth given how much misinformation is out there and and how susceptible they are to making mistakes in other words the argument goes it's a bad thing that human beings have the freedom to doom themselves and in light of that it's alleged that god is unjust okay um now first of all clearly such an argument this dismisses the response we've been providing so far you know uh namely that will divinely intervene and uh assist those with correct higher order intentions and and that we shouldn't only view belief formation and belief formation and retention processes through a purely naturalistic lens but but the critics still insist that it's inconceivable for people even to have such corrupt higher order desires but is it really inconceivable is it really inconceivable to imagine people knowingly wanting to make wrong decisions to consciously and deliberately opt for a decision they know isn't good for them whether in the short term or long term no it's it's not it's not inconceivable at all i mean i mean how many people smoke despite knowing it's bad for them both physically and financially and and and have no desire to quit i mean they have no desire to desire to quit some people here may counter that you know that this example only shows that people unknowingly commit irrational decisions you know for for in their minds they don't intend to so so so the guy who who who keeps smoking for example you know does so because he he believes that he has enough money to buy cigarettes and um and and thinks that the statistical probability that he would get lung cancer as a result of smoking isn't so high to be worried about so so even though his reasoning is defective he still isn't knowingly and intentionally making a wrong decision i would submit that this isn't the case with everybody who smokes uh but but but let's allow that response to to slide for the sake of argument i mean let's let's consider other examples um how many people how many people cheat on their spouses and want to continue cheating on their spouses or you know um you know i mean despite knowing that doing so is is very wrong according to the moral code that they follow or or how many people know full well that that they have to get that that that that aching tooth you know checked by the dentist but but but they're but they're so scared of the drill that they don't i mean they know that they're going to suffer down the line but but just to postpone going to the dentist they're willing to make things worse in the long term but but they're okay with that because the consequences are delayed or or or let's have some extreme examples i mean i mean how many have murdered others knowing full well that they would likely get caught but but that short-term desire to kill dominated their rationality some some statistics show that that more than half of criminals go back to committing crimes even after they've served their prison sentences um you know this this criminal recidivism you know highlights how many of these criminals are willing to choose a life of crime despite the consequential risks associated with making that decision you know such as getting caught again and and serving more time um the the simplest the simplest and most basic example one could give is the phenomenon of sinful muslims the phenomenon of sinful muslims all of us muslims alhamdulillah know that islam is true know that islam teaches that there are certain sins to avoid know that there is a real chance of being punished in hell you know even if temporarily for for sins that we knowingly commit how do we psychologically explain that how do you as a muslim psychologically explain to yourself how it is the case that you're willing to risk allah possibly not forgiving you for the sins you knowingly commit and possibly enduring hell temporarily on account of it is the sin you have committed worth gambling with that risk knowing what you know of the descriptions of hell's torments in in the islamic sources the irrationality is baffling yet many muslims periodically commit sins despite knowing and believing what they know and believe why well there is this undeniable phenomenon of of the weakness of the will you know where where we sometimes fail to resist temptations and and cave into our desires despite knowing better and and sometimes we make ourselves feel better about committing sins but by by by wilford by willfully um you know forgetting or suppressing information or even lying to ourselves you know we say things like you know i mean uh you know i will i'll repent later or you know uh allah is the most merciful he won't punish me and you know and we and we attempt to rationalize the irrational we can spend forever trying to debate why human beings knowingly and willingly make irrational decisions but but there is no doubt that this is what happens that that's not open to debate um and and and so with kufur and so with kufur as as explained before and now i'll not repeat them again there are a host of reasons that could motivate people to to choose to choose or or remain in their kuffur i mean changing changing your religion isn't merely an intellectual decision to to undergo such a spiritual transformation one must have virtuous character traits as well right like you know like humility and and sincerity and love of truth and love of god etc you know a spiritual transformation to the truth as liberating and amazing the experience could be still comes still comes with severe costs for many people the pain of losing your friends and family that the pain of losing your status in the community the pain of admitting that you have been wrong your entire life about the most important thing namely your purpose in life changing one's religion isn't a a mere rational decision it's much greater than that and and if people don't have that willpower and determination and necessary character traits they will come they will they will come with as many excuses as their creative minds would permit to justify not taking um you know that that necessary leap towards religious truth they take their chances playing with their everlasting destinies you know they say to themselves you know no you know i i don't want to make the required sacrifices or or you know i mean look i just i i just don't want to think and talk about this you know or or you know i mean look i'm a pretty good guy god's not going to throw me in hell you know or or you know and you know i just don't want to think about it so so much so that you know i could plead ignorance later you know they'll say a whole bunch of stuff to each to themselves and there you go and there you go they make the wrong fateful decision i mean they they deliberate they deliberate and and and and think about what they should do but eventually their their reason their reason yields to their passions and desires and and that's why we frequently read in the quran that these people are not soundly using their reason not that not that they don't have high iqs but rather because they let their personal desires overcome their reason when it comes to these extremely important spiritual life transforming decisions another objection is raised another objection raised um claims that claims that muslims are are are inconsistent you know the the the the the objection would say something like why are you muslims raising the bar much higher for non-muslims than for muslims i mean muslims don't feel obliged to research other religions so so why should others feel obliged i mean what warrants the muslim to be legitimately satisfied with his faith while while the same isn't granted to non-muslims i mean your average muslim doesn't know how to argue for his faith so so why should your average non-muslim be expected to do so i mean i mean just as the bulk of muslim laity feels comfortable brushing off preachers from other religions so too when it comes to non-muslims but but why are you muslims raising the bar and and expecting better from non-muslims than from yourselves you know and and oh by the way if you if you muslims were born into non-muslim families the probability that that that you would have converted to islam is extremely low so so that only goes to show that you're only muslims because you were socialized into it um well i mean this this can take take up an entire lecture on its own and and i'm not going to do that but but but this requires laying out the proofs for islam and demonstrating why it's unique compared to other you know every other belief system out there i'm not going to do that here i mean there are plenty of lectures and debates and written works one could check out for that however what i think the muslim response should be to this argument is that is that we muslims do not grant we do not grant that your average muslim layperson is relevantly similar to your average non-muslim layperson why well first first of all there are only a handful of serious intellectual contenders as belief systems to islam i mean not not all the religions out there have advocates presenting serious lines of evidence for their veracity i mean there's only there's only a handful of serious contenders to islam you know like christianity um religious pluralism deism you know and i hesitate to say atheism and agnosticism because of how totally absurd i find their stances but but let's let's include them in the list of you know let's include atheism and agnosticism in the list of serious contenders to islam because you know they have their so-called intellectual advocates um so so that's the first thing to bear in mind right muslims and non-muslims alike do not need to take any belief system seriously if it's clearly lacking when it comes to the level and and quality of evidence uh presented in its favor the second thing to bear in mind is that is that even out of these serious contenders the only one where the stakes are high if the muslim is wrong is christianity that's because christianity teaches that if you don't accept jesus in the manner it teaches then you'd end up going to hell so if christianity is true then that's a big problem for muslims but if deism is true or if religious pluralism is true or or if atheism is true there then there are no serious consequences for muslims even if hypothetically speaking islam turns out to be wrong so there's nothing to lose if you don't embrace these belief systems it's ultimately not a big deal um you know even with judaism even with judaism judaism teaches that if you follow the seven laws of noah if you follow the seven laws of noah which most muslims do then even a gentile even a gentile a non-jew can make it to heaven so even if judaism turns out to be true muslims have nothing to worry about i mean obviously i mean by the way this is all keeping aside the fact that there are very strong very strong critiques of deism and religious pluralism and atheism and judaism you know i'm not going to delve into all that you know in this talk i'm just pointing out i'm just pointing out that your average muslim need not necessarily feel prompted to seriously engage with these belief systems when the ultimate consequences for rejecting them are are negligible you know and and as for christianity as for christianity alhamdulillah as for christianity alhamdulillah your average lay muslim your average lay muslim knows fully you know knows fully well just how logically problematic the fundamental doctrines of the trinity and incarnation are they don't need to read all the philosophical literature to know that it's it's crystal clear and so they are warranted for rejecting christianity when its very fundamental doctrines are too tainted with these logical problems something that islam is free from the bulk of objections against islam these days are mainly ethical and it doesn't take a muslim genius to see how western moral dominance is playing a role in how god himself is not subject to these fluctuating man-made western standards so no i completely reject this assumption that muslims and non-muslims are somehow on an equal footing here no islam has very good evidence for itself it doesn't suffer from any serious logical problems and it claims that and it claims that there are you know severe consequences for rejecting it and there's no doubting there's no doubting that islam is a serious religion to contend with you know given given its history and and the number of its adherents and and the quality of its intellectual scholars and and the number of works offered demonstrating its truth th that that it is at least it is at the very least compelling enough to make the true seeker of truth the true seeker of truth at least consider it seriously all right and you know it is for those reasons it is expected that that sincere truth-seeking non-muslims do engage with islam by considering it seriously you know you know as their own faiths unlike islam in terms of the quality of the evidence put forth on behalf of them in in in you know in in in addition to islam being free of of of serious uh logical difficulties in his core doctrines right i mean muslims on the other hand um you know from from their perspective the serious contenders either either suffer from glaring problems obvious to lay men themselves or or you know you know or these serious contenders fail to effectively prompt muslims to even seriously consider them as viable uh intellectual and and religious alternatives islam because rejecting them you know has no serious ultimate consequences and and and this is keeping aside the fact this is all keeping inside the fact that um that uh you know that many muslims read the quran and allah in the quran allah in the quran you know speaks with this confident logically appealing tone that it's the truth and that the alternative that the alternatives are false you know reading the quran alone would shape the mind of its reader and you know it would shape the mind of its reader to be critical and confident about its truth hardly any religious book out there could even be said to resemble the quran in that manner anyways as i said i'm not going to dive into the the the arguments for for islam here right i mean i just wanted uh i just wanted to point out that that muslims need not believe need not believe that they are inconsistent and and uh unfair when it when it comes to the level of truth seeking standards expected of muslims and and non-muslims alike well um i believe i believe we've come to the end um so now for some concluding remarks um you know allah says you know if you're if your lord so willed um uh you know everyone on earth would have believed and you know and you know and he also said you know well well oh and if we and if we willed we would have we would have brought to every soul that's guidance however my my saying is true that that i will fill up hell with those from amongst the jinn and mankind is basically telling us that hell doesn't have to exist it doesn't have to exist he could have created iman in our hearts and that would have been the end of it nevertheless he has sovereignly chosen to create us with a purpose which entails us having the freedom to reject him and consequently make faithful decisions concerning our ultimate destinies you know i mean there there are many wisdoms underlying allah's creation of hell you know hell hell gives us solace and hope that that those who have escaped justice in this life would eventually be judged it it increases our confidence in allah's justice and as a result excuse me and and as a result you know it it also gives us the patience to wait for that justice and and not behave like vigilantes and try to take justice into our own hands in this life i mean the test i mean hell how hell is a testament to to just how important our actions and and and and words and and beliefs are it's quite amazing if you actually think about it i mean why would the beliefs and actions of finite creatures like us have such everlasting ramifications that they matter so much to the point that either everlasting heaven or everlasting hell awaits us as as outcomes of what we believe and do that shows how significant our beliefs and actions are we do matter and there's a sense of honor in that if you think about it but but more importantly hell is a testament to just how holy and and and supreme allah is you know it explicates it explicates just how horrendous of an evil committing you know it is it is by contemplating it is by contemplating the horrors of hell that we come to come to appreciate and acknowledge the magnitude of the ugliness of shirk i mean hell's hell's existence is a declaration of just how repugnant kufur is many many try to sweep hell under the rug to have that peace of mind but that's clearly a disastrous mistake and yes there's no doubt there's no doubt that this is an emotionally taxing subject and and i know what some of you may be thinking you might be thinking you know what look bassam you know you may have given all these clever rational responses but at the end of the day when i see my friendly non-muslim colleague at work or or my cheerful non-muslim neighbor i'm not going to digest the idea that they could possibly wind up in hell and look i i can understand and appreciate these sentiments i i really do but what we need to understand is that eman does not demand of us that we fully have a conceptual picture of hell and simultaneously desire and relish in the idea that people wind up in it and suffer you know on the contrary islam has has communally obligated muslims to engage in tawa not not merely as some other kind of islamic mandate to follow but but also as an expression of our care and and determination to see others saved from hell you know and and and we muslims also need to understand that that allah could have easily wired our brains and and manipulated our emotions so that we would have been entirely comfortable with the idea of hell but both intellectually and emotionally however i would submit that part of our test is to muster the willpower to to regulate our emotions through reason and and what i what i have tried to do what i've tried to do in this talk is is demonstrate that there is no successful definitive or probabilistic logical argument against the notion of of an of an everlasting punishment of hell uh you know for the car for the crime of shirk and if anybody if anybody um wishes to insist that such a punishment is uh incompatible with the attributes of allah then i'd expect that person to have fully considered and researched all the possible and plausible conceptions of god's attributes and ensure that there is in fact no possible way to reconcile everlasting hell with god's divine attributes logically and i'll say with utmost confidence that people who raise these objections have fallen extremely short in that endeavor you know assuming they even tried as as as opposed to just lazily settling on what their gut tells them to feel about the subject matter you know tyler dismisses dismisses excuses after the messengers have been sent and we in and we need to stop assuming that we know who the damned are better than allah we we need to fear allah and let him speak for himself and tell us what the standards for attaining salvation and an evading hell are so so in conclusion in conclusion we we've looked at some of the most um substantial arguments raised against the idea of of of everlasting hell um and uh you know and and and we've demonstrated that far from being definitive they are hardly persuasive or even plausible look we didn't literally we didn't literally cover every single argument out there but still we did cover alhamdulillah the most common and important ones and provided sufficient foundational principles that that that that would that would help us to address any other argument we haven't touched upon uh more easily um and you know of course it it doesn't seem doesn't seem fitting that we uh speak about hell for this long and you know without without concluding with a dua you know uh that allah you know you know protects us from hell um and with with that we we conclude subhanallah

Channel: Digital Mimbar

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Keywords: islam, muslim, muslims, islamic, quran, koran, allah, muhammad, mohammed, mohamed, prophet, hadith, sunnah, shaykh, imam, lecture, ramadan, bilal philips, sufi, salafi, hanafi, hijab, nasheed, convert, revert, shahada, dawah, da'wah, maher zain, sami yusuf, atheism, science, atheist, qur'an, recitation, surah, afasy, religion, religious, deen, madhhab, shia, sunni, Bassam Zawadi, The Rationale of Hell in Islam, Moral Evaluation, False Religious Beliefs, Blameworthiness, Immoral, Guide, Countering Objections, Punishment

Id: 1ve1dtkdybA

Length: 251min 5sec (15065 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 18 2021