The Importance of Understanding Attributes of Allah

By Naseer Ahmed

Allah is the sole source of all knowledge of what is right and what is wrong or what is moral and what is immoral. If we wish to master this knowledge perfectly, it is essential that we orient ourselves perfectly to receive this knowledge. The orientation is by gaining a perfect understanding of the nature of Allah or of all His attributes. Misunderstanding of any attribute leads to a wrong understanding of His Book, of right and wrong, and this is the way Satan misleads and deprives us of becoming perfect Muslim. The text of the Quran is preserved and protected from corruption but not the understanding of it.

This is not about memorising the 99 names of Allah but knowing the 99 attributes of Allah or of fully comprehending the nature or zaat of Allah. The attributes of Allah are best understood by a person who has understood the Quran without a single contradiction and without treating any verse as abrogated. Such a person has completely and perfectly understood the nature of Allah.

Islamic scholars have no problem with the contradictions their interpretations create because they think that Allah is free to contradict Himself because “He does what He wills” and this is proof of His omnipotence that he is not bound by any rule. By creating this misunderstanding of Allah’s attribute of His Will and Omnipotence, Satan has succeeded in making people worship the attribute of ‘whimsicalness’ which is Satan’s attribute and not Allah’s.

Allah certainly does what He wills but He has willed the rule of law and the law of perfect causality and He has also willed that he will never change His ways or change His command/word once it is issued. The Sign that the Qur’an is from Allah is that it is a Book without a single contradiction and if you are given a Book saying that it is from Allah and if that Book has even a single contradiction, throw it into the face of Satan because such a Book cannot be from Allah. While the Book is from Allah, our scholars, by their misinterpretations which create contradictions, have made it into a Book from Satan!

The Quran is a simple Book, easy to understand and without crookedness. All that is required is that we take its straight forward literal meaning. It is scholarship that puts a spin on every verse and misinterprets which is why the hadith which says that the scholars will be among the foremost who will be flung into Hell sounds true. The scholars put their spin because they misunderstand the attributes of Allah.

Take the attribute of justice. Is Allah just if those born into “Muslim” families have an edge over those born into families that practice polytheism? Some of our revered scholars of the past have said that some people are predestined to go to Heaven, while others are predestined to go to Hell or Allah has created some for Heaven and others for Hell. This obviously sounds whimsical and arbitrary which they explain away by saying “Allah wills what He wills”. They get both the attributes wrong.

The answer any reasonable person will give is that justice demands that persons born into any faith should have an equal chance of gaining Heaven/Hell, but Muslims will not voice this opinion, because it is drilled into their heads that non-Muslims are Kafir and they will all go to Hell, and what they see is that people born into a faith, remain in the same faith. Those who change their faith are a small number.

Those who seek an unambiguous answer from the Quran on this question, will find an answer, but those who firmly believe otherwise, will remain blind and deaf to the clear answer. This is because we have not even learnt to trust the word of Allah and read it without our mind cluttered with pre-conceived notions. The reading therefore does not benefit us. For more on the subject, read:

The Muslims, in general, are far from correctly comprehending the most important attributes of Allah. They may worship only one God, but this God is partial to them, which is not an attribute of the Rabb-ul-Alameen who is Al ‘Adl or perfectly just, but the attribute of the gods of the polytheists. So, how can a polytheist be at a disadvantage vis-à-vis a Muslim, whose concept of his God is defective to the extent that he attributes to Allah, the same quality of partiality, which is what makes the many gods of the polytheists so very attractive to them?

If the Muslims correctly understand this attribute, they will then know that they are not in any way superior to any other people except by virtue of their good deeds. Their attitude to the ‘other’ changes dramatically for the better. We are then open to what is good in them and appreciate it.

If there was no Hell would the world have been a better place? Allah is the epitome of morality or what maximizes good. Hell is also a part of His Mercy therefore without which there would have been more oppression, injustice and misery in this world. The description of Hell Fire in the Quran is that it is a great continuous torment.

(4:56) The Kafaru, We shall soon cast into the Fire: as often as their skins are roasted through, We shall change them for fresh skins, that they may taste the penalty: for Allah is Exalted in Power, Wise.

If the warning of Punishment in Hell wasn’t a Mercy, Allah wouldn’t have said:

(55:37) When the sky is rent asunder, and it becomes red like ointment:

(38) Then which of the favours of your Lord will ye deny?

Our capacity for both good and evil is dependent upon the autonomy or free will that Allah has granted us. Without autonomy, we would have been like animals without choice for either good or evil and lived in accordance with our instincts. There would have been no need for either Heaven or Hell then. The question then is:

Was Allah Unjust in Creating Adam and Favouring His Progeny Over All His Creation?

If the Hell had been made less painful, then the Heaven would have been made less pleasant, and our autonomy curtailed to decrease our potential for both good and evil. Allah finds the perfect balance. There is both infinite divine wisdom and mercy in the creation of Hell and making it what it is, without which there wouldn’t have been Heaven either, and the freedom to choose our path. Then which of the favours of your Lord will ye deny?