six eight seven eight three seven i said our topic for discussion today will see existence of god to on so your questions on i'm absolutely delighted and it's my great pleasure to welcome a very distinguished panel to fa questions and the first one comes from a gentleman by the name of the i think that it reminds me of a qur'anic instruction to make an attempt to understand god through his attributes and being a creator is one of the important and fundamental attributes see that he is in fact given us clear evidence of the purpose of creation as well in the koran and they've been cycles of creation this cycle that we are going through as we understand is not the only cycle that he's ever created there may have been cycles of creation before there is definite evidence in the qur'an that he's created extraterrestrial life even though scientists are still wondering whether it is definitely present and they're looking for signs of it but we as but the koran is quite specific and psalms quite clear on that definitely saw that it's clear in the koran that speaks about existence of life outside this planet and in fact what the verse also says is that if god wills at some stage he will make the human race be put in contact with that life so in fact it's food for thought for muslim scientists very much so to be working on this issue similarly there's another verse in the koran that speaks of the possibility of bringing a more worthy and more able race or life form after the end of the human life so a lot is inherently a creator and his attribute is not why did he indeed create jinn and the creator well apparently it seems as if he's alluding to a verse in the holy  that i have not created the jinn and the man but that they may worship me this whole concept of what is jinn is a long can run into him up very briefly water heater refly the meaning of gin is anything which is hidden from the common i have people so this could refer to such people who don't intermingle with society very often but live in their own separate abodes but the concept of this verse is that all those people who have been given the mental capacity to recognize and worship their lord they have been instructed to do so and this is the purpose of their life a lot of people raised this objection this will apparently this seems like a very selfish a concept then that  him and this is the purpose of our life but if we delve deeper into the meaning of a bar that has mention in this work the verse he will see that it is quite the opposite it is not a selfish concept it is a very sympathetic concept which relates to human kind because this word is derived from the arabic root which means to be a slave which naturally entails that meaning that in order to fulfill the right of worship we should follow all of the commands which allow the almighty has given us and we see that there is two aspects of commands one are the who are those rights which are due to god the almighty that is worshipping him remembering him offering our prayers in schools and then there's another aspect which is called who quickly but which are those rights which are due to fellow man to be sympathetic to help people to benefit society in any way shape or form and the  the founder of the amity a muslim community may bless him he has met mention something in his books he says that will forgive those rights which are due to him if there is a negligence but he is very he is much more strict as far as the rights are concerned which are owed to man so if we understand this aspect of worship from this aspect we will see that it is telling us that we should do whatever in our power to help fellow man and if we do that with the intention of pleasing our lord if for example we help a poor man who doesn't have food and we clothe him and we give him food and we do this with this concept that has told us to do so and we should be humble and sympathetic then this is the essence of worship so this is not something which should be looked upon from this aspect that this is a selfishness of god almighty is quite the opposite and just picking on you know if i could come to you on th as answered this question as i understood it when i was listening to the question because man not only lives faculties beyond the animal kingdom it's sure and one of them is volition i think as i understood it this seems to be the real crux of the question here that he's pointing out that man is different in that he has volition and i would venture to say that the slum the promised messiah maddie has pointed out that the existence of man's foolish is in fact what entitles men to the beauty of reward for his actions so this is the most important thing here for example as we understand in the islamic concept of angels they have no volition they simply do with they are commanded and they are as it were a list computers when he issues a command of the angels which regulate the universe bring that about the same goes for the animals in the trees and less as in reference to the trees in the stimulus plants they humbly submit to his will this is because these things are regulated by the animals by the angels rather but man man has volition he has the ability to choose in other words he has the ability to put things in their proper place by using his god given faculties of intelligence and goodness he is his counsellor that has placed inside of his heart or he can put them in his improper place and this in word in religious terms is called a sin in other poor is to put something in its improper place or at the improper time place and occasion this is what would would be termed a sin and then to put it in its proper place is what we would call to do good so man has that choice and this is what in fact helps men in his physical psychological and spiritual development the ability to choose and put the thing using his reason rationality knowledge in its proper place at its proper time and occasion and this helps towards meant physical psychological and spiritual development there is as i said everything that's going to happen or not happen this means everything this pre destiny predestination everything is set off and is said in order to given this how can then god in quotes from his question he s change his mind and do something else if not he can't be sort of in that sense this is a very interesting question and it relates to two attributes of all of the almighty we must realize that no attribute contradicts another attribute of god the almighty rather all of the attributes of god the almighty run in parallel to one another just as many many streams run in the same direction so this question directly relates to a less they present an interesting example they say for example jack went out to commit a crime and did a learn no out of his perfect knowledge that he was going to commit the crime if so did jack have the ability not to commit the crime if so then that means less knowledge would be flawed and then on the other side they say that let's say if i learn knew that jack was going to commit the crime and jack has to commit the crime because if he doesn't commit the crime then less knowledge would be flawed so you can and in that case then everything would be predestined we don't have the choice to do anything outside the knowledge of god the almighty at first thought it seems like a interest seems like it takes you back a bit how can these two things go hand in hand but they can because we can understand this from an example even in our daily lives it's false to say that the knowledge of god the almighty limits a person's destiny and he can only do that which our lives already predestined for him free will is still there the example is let's say we're speaking to a person and from his questions and his answers and his from his discussions we see that he has the intention of committing a crime later today or perhaps he's asking about a certain home and it seemed as if he is going to commit a robbery in that home and we have this knowledge based on our natural faculty of deduction does this mean that has mentioned this very example that knowledge does not limit the free will of man man has the free will quite the contrary since jack was going taking this same example forward since jack was going to commit the crime this a perfect knowledge knew about it not the other way around that because knew about it that's why jack was compelled to commit the crime so it's another perspective and similarly even in a mother child relationship you will see that she will be able to deduct things very quick also i think it's a very intriguing point and during question answer sessions a lot of people ask about this issue because it is linked to the process of accountability that you've just referred to if everything's pre determined and predestined then how can somebody be held accountable in relation to the example of the crime that with jack there is no evidence from koran that all our life is definitely predestined in fact koran is saying that the human being is the pinnacle of evolution of life on this planet and the fact that we are the pinnacle is because we have the choice option which is also  once we make choices then the consequences are become our responsibility laws of nature is what laws of nature are what what reigns supreme if we live in harmony in terms of  understanding and in our behavior to the laws of nature then we are likely to be developing as a human race as well as individuals however if we contradict these laws in more than one ways whether it's physical or cycle spiritual manner then the individual suffers as well as the society suffers and some of the consequences about the greenhouse effect etc is in fact going in contradiction with some of the laws of nature and therefore suffering as a human human race  so touching on the point of accountability there are different levels of destiny and i think that is important for people to understand the so that this intrigue is taken care of there is aspect of destiny where if a law wills it will happen but it's associated with certain conditions and those conditions are in fact our responsibility if we fulfill those conditions is something that is going to apply whatsoever degree of inheritance in terms of how long they're going to live date from their family make up any inherited diseases etc but within that span say sixty to eighty years it's been the genetic makeup of the particular individual it would depend on how that person leads their life as to whether they're going to die at sixty or eighty and it was sometimes in between if they start smoking or don't eat healthy life or don't do any exercise then of course you're going in contravention to the laws of nature  the same principle can also apply to our spiritual effort and i think when there was a question about the worship when we worship it is our spiritual effort to grow spiritually and therefore develop our souls and it is important to then recognize that our destiny to a great degree is in our hands now the other question that you referred to in terms of mercy about i law that tribute tribute yes i think partly again this question's been we cannot apply the same rules of understanding to creation and the creator the attributes of the creation and the creator are different so allies tribute had to be there for them to be applied to or creation in fact logically that is the only way to conceive it to ask a question how could be lord of the world before he had even created a new world i think in fact the other question is more valid how could there be a creation if there was no god that was the lord and the master creator so they had a person's sort of genetics if you like reason either choose the choices they do on life and how they lead their lives in puerto montt before it come to you your just to comment on that and also perhaps that again continuing with the resolves questions next intervene and stop putting dams in place blowing up mountains and what have you but coming back to the first point on the attributes and then linking it to this concept of hasn't god created everything perfectly so why does he allowed  know as you were speaking i was thinking to myself that this is exactly the case but then it occurred to me that in the holy koran itself when it comes to the question of lord of all the worlds now naturally if there if one could could see for of an existence that has no existence with the exception of the person of the right yes then of course there are no worlds hypothetically speaking  of in fact since there doesn't exist anything then he is the lord of even that non existence but i would recommend that the questioner take a look at the verses of the koran there are two that come to my mind the first is that a let himself when he points out his act of creation and it says on the last day that he settled himself on the throne this verse right here he in fact answers this question where he says he he says after i have created creation then it became established that i was the creator of this creation so i let himself actually answers this question but yes i created creation and once i did so then it became established that i was the one who had done this so this is the answer to the first question and i let himself alone the law has provided the answer to that in he got out the second part of it however in terms of the have pointed out one of the reasons for this which touches back on our earlier question man has been created to develop within himself the qualities of similar to that god has placed in him so that may in fact look into him like the one with the most beautiful countenance looks into a mirror and sees himself in the face of man and man in fact can look into his own mirror and see the attributes of god indeed right so by adopting and adopting these attributes of god the most beautiful names is a lie himself has said one does not see the surfeit the abd or the tool if you will does not see themselves in that mirror when they look into that mirror all they see is the face of god so this other attribute here in terms of this mercy there's another verse that says how can you disbelieve in god when you are without life and then he gave you life and then he will cause you to die and then to him will be a return ninety nine percent of human beings if you x them no matter what kind of life they're having would you rather die but would you rather live till tomorrow and perhaps there will be some change they'll say yes i'd rather live in fact the need for survival is the strongest urge in man so life itself to be granted life itself from nothing is in fact the greatest mercy that man has been given so this is the first thing that comes to my mind the second which is somewhat linked to that in point number six saying that if god is omnipotent and all wise everything is already in the right place this comes back to what i mentioned before so god has given man out of his graciousness like we say it money  t things that were given to man without him having anything to do whatsoever with it like for example right now in this room we have all of this light and we have been given however if this light were not in the room despite how perfect our eyes were they would never even work and we couldn't see a thing without the light of the sun same thing you could not hear my voice no matter how excellent your ears are right now if there were not oxygen in this room so there is a quality of had everything so you've had your bed and you've got the warmth and comfort of your mother you've got the umbilical cord delivering to you everything that you needed and you were even conscious that you win there right so that in itself is a mercy where does man come in what is things being put in their improper place when man as we mentioned earlier using his volition to put things in their improper place so he sets up dams whenever man does things for the good of mankind my god says clinton cairo limiting us you are the best people raise for the good of mankind whenever a man does things for the good of mankind as a whole there's much blessing and god is very pleased with these things no matter to what religion he belongs but whenever a man puts things in their improper place using the resources that god has given him this is what as dr saad has mentioned earlier causes suffering to himself especially in the long run and suffering to men and so all these resources god has given to men no matter what religion he is no matter what his persuasion is for the use of these things in a beneficence way for the rest of mankind it is man himself who will benefit from these things but it also means that it is man himself who will suffer the detriment when these things are used improperly things man and i think in question six when the you know themselves asking this question it's the assumptions being made that he's taking and then perfection that man is taking in and perfection of the world other living beings absolutely the thing which we must understand with regard to this question is that the use of human faculties for the benefit of society as a whole does not at all justify or qualify in perfection in the creation of god the almighty because if those tools were not there for us with which we could use our faculties and benefit society then how far would we have gotten in life similar the is the case with  he has given as brother has mentioned he has given us oxygen for example he has given us sunlight he has given us other blessings which we did not deserve we did not ask for them or pray for them out of his infinite mercy blessed us with those things now that the use or misuse is what makes those things good or bad and of course expects that we will use these tools which he has given us to the betterment of ourselves and to the betterment of society as well for if he wants to do it then by the end of the year all have a crop the promised messiah says that this is a very very dangerous thought and it is in injustice towards god the almighty as if you are testing god the almighty has power and of course he has the power to do that he can cultivate a crop without any effort or human intervention but then how would we be worthy of reward the fact that has given us faculties to be used in itself qualify the fact that we should will give you but the condition is that you must work you must exert an effort and don't we see this in our worldly matters as well anybody who wishes to acquire success in his career or in his jobs does he expect all sit at home without going to an interview without working without studying and i will be appointed a is a president of a company of course not he works towards that so why do the problem is that when we analyze and work in our worldly affairs we understand this law very well everybody knows that they have to work hard in order to make anything in life but when the spiritual realm presents itself everybody becomes lazy and if a loved one or he'll do it but this is injustice why why do we not exert the same effort in those matters as well in the laws of nature in the laws of spirituality of course we must deal with both of these around with an equal hand and only then will we be administering asked the question how can i explain the concept of the existence of god to those who have a scientific bent of mind and link to another question we have is if there is no compulsion in religion as it says in the holy koran and it is based entirely upon personal faith then doesn't this mean it is impossible to scientifically prove the existence of god if i could come to you first of all science doesn't prove god exists again a question automatic acceptance of that reason and therefore why isn't it that people are beginning to accept this on the basis of logical conclusion however i think before i try to make an attempt to scientifically demonstrate the existence of god let me first say what promised messiah may allow be pleased with him say's about the best way to reach god and he's spoken of three basic principles and they are evidence witness and personal experience evidence is all around us as we've been referring to it's the floor less working of natural principles irrespective of whatever conditions witness is when we see with our eyes the the proof of existence of god or the promises that have been made by a god to his people so in spite of all odds and in spite of worldly and mighty opposition the responding and blessing us with what he thinks is justifiably a response to those prayers and there are not just thousands millions of people in the world who have experienced god in this way and i think once you've gone through that stage of your relationship with god there is no doubt left in that individual's mind that god exists so those are the principles given to us however i think it is important to try to respond to the question in a more like material sciences way it is well one of them is that in fact there are lots of points so i just have to go through them list them this is a universal quest for god it has always been there even before modern science existed people were intrigued about god when people had no ways of communicating with each other in history independently those subcultures were intrigued about god and had their own ways of relating to in order so there is something two mistaken logics i would say one is out of sight out of mind yes and we know that there are so many things that we cannot physically see we've referred to the presence of oxygen and radiation etc but they exist so similarly they can be other beings especially a creator that would exist and we may not be able to perceive with our basic needs or basic senses the other difficulty people have is the need of discipline recognizing the authority of a creator means that we have to lead our lives in a certain way by a certain code of conduct and if it becomes uncomfortable especially to those people who may not have been used to living in that disciplined way it's a harder look at the intelligent design of the universe can we comprehend anything being created even as our scientific invention which has an intelligent design but without there being some kind of wisdom or planning going into it in fact  no so how can we expect an intelligent smooth functioning universe to be there without there being an intelligent creator another very important point the modern science has led to the conclusion that consciousness which can be defined as our awareness of our surroundings and our ability to relate to our surroundings this is not possible to come out of lack of consciousness so if conscious beings exist that means a conscious creator existed before the conscious beings were born and logically or philosophically speaking if you do the cause and effect phenomena and keep taking it backwards the ultimate cause of all causes is what you can think of comes from the creator and that's god so in that sense i would say that the ancient science the modern science and even divine words of revelation have a commonality about the existence of god or the evidence for existence of god aristotle said that it is not possible for the ultimate cause of all creation to be says that if you create mass and then you're going to lose mass in any process of creation of mass from mass you lose some but the creation of universe in fact is a very unique phenomena it is beyond this particular scientific principle it is creation of a huge amount of mass out of immense form of energy and now the modern science has begun to say that you can actually create  companions people of their times to be the most honest people who would not do anything for their selfish interest and they have lived in different times in history and different parts of the world without they have been any material mechanism of communication between them and all of them have actually succeeded in creating beautiful societies with high moral standards in their followers and when asked the question where do they get this guy he didn't throw all of them  very comprehensive succinct but very comprehensive at the same time response as well both in terms of human nature explaining the specifics the cause and effect reality but a lot of people with you know that they look at life  say you know how did i get here what caused this to be what's the general purpose and even for an atheist i suppose you know if you have a discussion with them quite often the net result is what what created what do you actually believe in nt to be used even with people who have no belief absolutely but one thing which we must understand is that who created the big bang was it a concept who was it a phenomenon which occurred just by itself  this is where we differ and we say that there must have been a conscious being who resulted in the occurrence of the big bang because as we know nothing happens without cause and effect as you have mentioned this cause and effect system as we find in science is something which is accepted even by atheists the problem is that very humbly i would say without offending anybody that atheist friends they will go to that because they're in denial of god the almighty is being they will they realize that there must be a cause and effect system so they will go up to the big bang or whatever they believe the scientific explanation for the origin of the universe is but then their denial won't let them go any further that's where faith comes in and that's where we believe the promised messiah has mentioned that no matter how many arguments we present this concept we can bring you to the level that there should be a god but this concept of that there is a god is where this aspect of faith also comes in but we must also explain that that concept of faith is not unwarranted or unjustified because  eloquently that scientifically speaking in order to have a system which works with the which works with each other and you see no contradiction in the laws of nature if this was by chance then use should have seen some haphazard concept in the universe but we see that everything runs in its proper measure and this is the argument which is presented by the holy koran as well that look at the universe will you see any flaw i look again you will never find any fl the universe of god the almighty and this is the proof of the fact that there is a controller a intelligent controller which results which resulted in the occurrence of the big bang or whichever scientific philosophy you would like to say that began the universe and then controls the universe as well to ensure that it doesn't slip out of its bounds so to ensure that everything continues working hand in hand with each other a scientist has mentioned something very interesting and i love the statement i was reading and he said that to say that the universe was a haphazard phenomenon and created maybe by only a big bang or another scientific principle and there was no guardian or ruler over that to control the course of events is like saying there was an explosion at a printing press and a dictionary was formed as a result of that it's absolutely unfathomable and you see in a dictionary that everything every letter is placed in its proper place so too do we see that in the universe as well so how come when we accept that masterpiece of literature cannot be produced without an intelligent hand a good writer how then can we accept that the universe which functions with each other can be created without a lord so we must understand that this intelligence is what proves the fact this intelligence in the universe proves that there is an intelligent creator as well and without that we have no other option if you look at it from that aspect again a very this question could dominate not just one faith matters but several on shore we must move on to sort of another question again continuing on the concept of the existence of god this comes from who asked if god provides the sustenance for all living things as reference by the holy koran the more i do some people die of starvation indeed a natural disaster are punishments from got taken that together the whole concept of people dying of starvation and yet god should provide or god says he's the provider for were talking you know i was reminded of a quote by albert einstein where he says religion without science is dead science without religion is blind and i always love that quote science without religion is blind so anyway on that same basis however when i think of the question about these natural events economic crises and so forth and so on i remember of course you know riding my bicycle down the street and maybe trying out a few tricks so where the case may be and of course falling all over the street anyway  the whole idea was i learned a lesson that if it don't perform such tricks or perhaps this is where we are wrong ok so my point is that there are several things in our daily experience that in fact teach us what works well by it it's running smoothly actually and then there's the certain things that when they don't run well teaches us who doesn't work right so there's two types of experiences that the promise of silence law to small peace be upon him points out there are trials that an individual and an individuals only a microcosm of a large group of people so we'll just take the individual and then we can relate it to a group or body or nation of people will just point out individual this makes it easy to understand there's two types of things that happens to the individual one is by way of trial in other words that this is something designed to help develop this individual further in his psychological or spiritual development that he may deem as an unpleasant happening but you know what if that hadn't happened for example if you went to go across the street while the light was green and you got clipped it will just say it like that by a speeding car and you know not to cross the street without looking to need cars or coming right now naturally someone of good intelligence would stand out from that and say thank goodness i'm still alive well i knew not to cross the street here again so yes it's unpleasant but it has taught you a lesson so both of these two examples in other words one by way of trial something that is inflicted upon man or something that's a result of man's own mad calculation or mistake that he learns from and he knows not to do that again and then there is something which the questioner has pointed out a punishment from god but what i would humbly submit is that punishments from god themselves are in fact mercy the reason for this is because it is designed to draw your attention to a greater good you know what often happens is that man sometimes gets himself caught up in certain things that he thinks is beneficial in the same way that children do when their parents are looking or when the children think their parents are looking and this in fact isn't good for the child  and the parent knows it's in the parent wants to do to try to draw their attention away from those things will god actually does the same thing except that he lets the child tease the bad consequences of that thing himself so that the child then runs away from those things having learned a lesson himself and runs back as we say running to mommy so does the same exact thing to his child if you were meaning his creation he says all right so you have involve yourself in this because you know within this thing you have again as we mentioned earlier in the show you have ignored or you have become distracted from the most beautiful thing that i have in fact given you consciousness to discover and that is me and this is not selfish at all it is only selfish when the thing which is the object of the love is limited or flawed in some way but as we've pointed out with dr saab we find no flaw in the creation we find no flaw in any of the attributes all of the beauties in bounties that have been given to you who are in fact waiting for you when you arrived here on earth in life in consciousness so in short all of these calamities afflictions financial crises well if you've had a hole in your pocket and someone told you not to put the money in that hole and you either in that pocket or at least to so that whole in short there is a trial which means that there is no fault of your own this is just meant to develop other qualities in you patience during the afflictions  god that regulates to speak material universe right and by inference you say well if this is this then he must exist science leads us up to that for a while god in fact says present i am with you and in reality many of the trials as well as the punishments as god has said in the holy qur'an himself and when we intend to guide a people we first afflict them meaning that we jolted out of their being in groups and all of these things that are in fact distracting them from the one true most important purpose of their life the beauty in their happiness and source of peace in their life they have become distracted from so you know they say pinch me i'm dreaming what does the person mean when they say that they mean that i'm caught up in this imaginary world and i need you to wake me up so pinch me what is that a little bit of discomfort so fa i mean faith i think is ultimately prayer and these things we talk about natural disasters we very quickly would you know we're running quite short of time into the last few minutes of the program but just to pick up on this far as an atheist is concerned this objection is unwarranted because he doesn't believe in god so then he should accept this as a natural occurrence but as far as religious people are concerned that is a different story those people who believe in god the understand and accept the fact that there is a life which is to come which is an everlasting life which is the source of all peace and all blessing and all tranquility and that is the life which we work towards in this world to acquire the pleasures of that world and the pleasures of our god so if an innocent child is taken away in a natural disaster then this is not injustice because our love will reward him in the hereafter so we must understand it from this  your questions we will return to that at a future program gentlemen thank you very much for your contributions to a very absorbing program and a very important subject we were covering off which was the existence of god and of course for us thank you to you without you matters would not be