It is the belief of the People of Tawḥīd and Sunnah that Allāh creates and commands for wisdoms that return to Himself and to His servants. Because He is al-Ḥakīm (the all-Wise) who creates and commands for wisdoms.
The people of misguidance such as the Ashʿarites claim that if Allāh has wisdoms in what He creates and legislates, this implies that He would benefit from doing those things, indicating that He is in need of those things, being deficient prior to it and being perfected after it. This doubt has been expressed by one of their heads and leaders known as Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 606H).
The People of Tawḥīd and Sunnah responded to this philosophy, in affirmation of the truth:
Shaykh al-Islām Ibn Taymiyyah (رحمه الله) said:[1]
That which the majority of the Muslims are upon from the Salaf and the Khalaf is that Allāh the Exalted creates for a wisdom and commands for a wisdom, and this is the view (madhhab) of the leading scholars in jurisprudence and knowledge.
He the Sublime is Wise (Ḥakīm), He does not do anything in vain, nor without meaning, benefit and wisdom which comprise the desired goal behind the act. Rather, His actions—Sublime is He—emanate from far-reaching wisdom for which He acted just as they arise on account of reasons (asbāb) for which He acted. His speech and the speech of His Messenger have indicated this in [so many] places that are difficult to enumerate
Notes
01 Allāh is al-Hakīm (the All-Wise) in His creation and command, all of Allāh’s actions and His commands (in His legislations) arise from far-reaching wisdoms which return:
a) To Himself, such as aiding the believers because of His love for them and prohibiting shameful deeds because of His ghayrah, which is His dislike of what is shameful, evil, and
b) To His servants, such as aiding them and such as making lawful for them the good and wholesome and prohibiting the unwholesome and filthy.
02 In reality, Allāḥ creating and legislating for wisdoms is but the attainment of His wish (murād), which is from perfection. Further, wisdom is His attribute and is not something other than Him, such that it can be said that He was in need of other than Himself by which He attains perfection. Ibn al-Qayyim (رحمه الله) has extensively refuted the doubts of the Ashʿarites in his book Shifāʾ al-ʿAlīl.
03 The Qurʾān is full of evidences in affirmation of this truth and from them is the statement of Allāh: ( وَمَا خَلَقْتُ ٱلْجِنَّ وَٱلْإِنسَ إِلَّا لِيَعْبُدُونِ ) “And We did not create Jinn and Men except that they may worship Me.” (51:56) Here the wisdom for creating Jinn and Men is made clear and it is that they worship Allāh, for their own benefit, not that He is need of them in any way, as is established in the verses that follow. Allāh had that wisdom prior to creating them and when He created them, His wish (irādah)—which is tied to His justice, wisdom and mercy—was fulfilled, this being from His perfection in that He is the doer of whatever He wills.
Likewise, the statement of Allāh: “And We did not send you (O Muḥammad) except as a mercy for the worlds.” ( وَمَآ أَرْسَلْنَٰكَ إِلَّا رَحْمَةً لِّلْعَٰلَمِينَ ) (21:107). So here, there is a wisdom for sending the Messenger (صلى الله عليه وسلم) and that wisdom returns back to Allāh, in that He sent the Messenger because of His mercy for His servants, doing this out of His mercy, and it returns to His servants who are recipients of this mercy, which is the Messenger, and the Qurʾān and the legislattion, the lawful and the unlawful, all of which is a mercy and benefit to them.
04 None of this implies that He is somehow in need of goals and objectives (ghāyāt) as claimed by those who say that Allāh’s actions arise through pure will (mashīʾah) alone, devoid of wisdom, mercy and the likes.
They claim Allāh does not have wisdoms (objectives, goals) prior to His acts (as it implies He is in need). This means He did not create Jinn and Men for any purpose or wisdom and He did not legislate and command for any purpose or wisdom.
05 Since they denied wisdom in Allāh’s actions and returned the affair back to pure will, they said Allāh can enter the righteous into Hellfire and the disbelievers into Paradise because the affair is one of pure will, devoid of wisdom, thus all things become possible. However, Allāh’s will is tied to His wisdom and His justice and He only wills and does that which is wise and just.
The negation of wisdom in Allāh’s actions leads to misguided statements and great corruption in belief.
The Ashʿarites deny that Allāh acts for wisdoms. This is in the subject matter of creed. However, when it comes to the issue of rulings (aḥkām)—and we know that there are indeed wisdoms behind what Allāh has legislated, some of which we know through revelation itself and some of which we do not know—the Ashʿarites were hard-pressed because the contradiction was apparent.
They negate wisdoms in the subject of the Names and Attributes, yet in the rulings, they are faced with the reality that Allāh has legislated things for wisdoms and purposes which are evident.
So they entered into mental and linguistic gymnastics to work around this issue, similar to what they do in other areas of creed in which they have deviance, trying to reconcile revelation with flawed corrupt reason.
06 In summary, there are three positions:
a) The view of the Muʿtazilah that although Allāh does act for a wisdom and objective, this wisdom and objective is not something established with His essence, but is established in other than His essence, because of their claim that conceptual meanings (meaning attributes) cannot be established with His essence as that would amount to multiplicity.[3]
b) The view of the Ashāʿirah who claim that Allāh does not act for a wisdom, objective or reason, and that Allāh acts through pure will (mashīʾah), devoid of wisdom, mercy and the likes. Thus, there is no wisdom in creation of Jinn or Men, and no wisdom in sending revelation or sending down the rain and so on. Everything happens through pure will stripped of wisdoms, objectives and reasons.
c) The view of Ahl al-Sunnah that Allāh acts for a wisdom and objective and that Allāh’s will is tied to His wisdom and justice, as has preceded. Thus, the evident wisdoms that we see and recognise in creation and legislation are evidence that Allāh is all-Wise and that He has the attributes of wisdom, mercy, justice and others.
Thus, when we study the creation and the causes and the effects and the way they have been tied together, we see wisdoms and goals. And likewise, when we study the legislation of Allāh, we see wisdoms and goals in what Allāh has commanded and prohibited, what He made lawful and unlawful, what He described as good and wholesome and what He described as evil and impure.
07 As such, the People of Tawḥīd and Sunnah are the most insightul and deeply rooted with respect to the creation and the command.
Footnotes
1. Majmūʿ al-Fatāwā (8/377).2. Shifāʾ al-ʿAlīl (Turāth) p. 400.
3. This is false, because having attributes does not entail multiplicity of essences.