The Islamic belief system contains many articles of faith pertaining to God and His qualities, prophethood, imamate, resurrection, etc. The human being is also one of those subjects Islamic theology will have things to say about. One of the most important beliefs in regards to the human being has to do with free will. In this course, we seek to explore this matter through verses of the Qur’an by first establishing that the creation of humankind revolves around free will. That is, if there was to be no free will, humankind would not have been created to begin with. After establishing this Qur’anic principle, the scope and extent of free will needs to be determined, because there is so much going on around us beyond our control. How is this in harmony with the principle of free will? Which examples of free will are ones that justify our creation and which aren’t? There is much predetermination we are subject to, yet there are still answers to the question of free will in all of this predetermination.

Once the scope of free will necessary to justify our creation has been determined, one will find much contradictory evidence to this rule in Islamic literature, namely the Qur’an and hadiths. There will be verses/hadiths implying – at first glance – how Allah (swt) is the one who guides and misguides, how we cannot will except if Allah (swt) wills, how in the end it will only be what Allah (swt) wants, how evil people are evil ‘in the womb of their mothers’, etc. Such literature can be a serious problem and if not addressed, can plant seeds of doubt in one’s mind. We seek to decipher these types of statements found in our literature and come up with a standard to correctly understanding them

In addition to all of the above, we will attempt to answer questions pertinent to matters beyond our control such as:

1 – Why wasn’t I born infallible like the prophets/imams so I can have a free pass to heaven?
2 – Why are some people born into Muslim families while others aren’t and how is that fair because one group will make it to heaven while the other won’t?
3 – Why didn’t God ask me if I want to be created to begin with?
4 – If God knows what I am going to do in the future, does that mean I have no choice but to do what He knows? Can we even do anything that goes against His immaculate knowledge?
5 – Do Qada’ and Qadar not take away all control over matters from us?