An old Latino once asked me:

Who created the Creator?

I said:

This common question is meaningless. It is similar to the question: Who baked the baker?

He said:

If we accept the existence of a Creator for the sake of argument, then this Creator should be complex in structure, because this universe is complex, so its creator would require an even greater explanation.

He also said:

The concept of ​​the Trinity is closer to the truth than the oneness of the Creator.

I told him what I heard once and I liked it:

The philosopher and agnostic Anthony Kenny says:

“The argument that the atheists make that the complexity of the universe is a direct indication of the complexity of the creator is a fallacy. The electric razor which is made up of many different component parts serves fewer functions than the cutthroat razor which is made up of one part. The cutthroat razor cut your throat, and cuts a fruit”.

The questioner said:

The Trinity’s proof is that God in eternity and before He creates the universe had attributes. If He was only one, His attributes would be disrupted. Therefore, He had to be three in one in order to be merciful, give sustenance, and interact through the three who are within Him.

I said:

I, for example, am a good speaker. Therefore, when I decide to be silent, does this speaking trait disrupt inside me?

He said:

Does not the concept of God in Islam, Who is the Eternal, Self-Sufficient, contradict God’s need for human existence to have mercy on them and forgive them?

I said:

God has a Will, He does not have a need.

He said:

Why the Creator does not incarnate in any of his creatures?

I said:

How is it possible to accept mating a human with a cow or another animal to give birth to a half-human and half-animal for animal nature to become one of the human forms? (i.e., animal nature is the embodiment of the human image)

Certainly، this is a moral decadence and an underestimation of the human being whom God blessed and honored.

What about if the matter is related to the Creator, the Unique, Glory be to Him?

How is it possible for the divine nature to converge with the human nature or whatsoever, in order for the human nature to become the embodiment of the divine image?! The human who is born of a woman, who is in need of care, will end up dying and being buried like other creatures.

Certainly, this is a belittling of the Almighty God.

He said:

You believe that the Creator has a hand, is this not an embodiment?

I said:

As a human being, I have a hand, and the door has a hand, but the difference between them is vast. By this analogy, we say that the Creator is not like humans.

The Almighty said in Surat Al-Shura-11:

The Originator of the heavens and the earth. He made for you mates from among yourselves, and pairs of animals, through which He multiplies you. There is nothing like Him. He is the Hearing, the Seeing.

Islam calls to honor the Creator from imperfections and shortcomings.

A Hindu with a Ph.D. once told me:

If God is omnipotent, what prevents Him from descending in an animal or human form?

I answered him with an example I had heard once and liked:

When God descends into a human being form, he would abandon His attribute of divinity. There is a big difference between the Creator’s attributes and creatures’ attributes. If you were told that the air became a plane in New York, would you believe that?

The air has nothing to do with the plane. The quality of the air is completely different from that of the plane, so one cannot choose the image of the other.

He said:

We worship statues in order to have mental focus while worshiping the Creator, and to avoid mind wandering to worldly things.

I was very surprised by the words of this man who attained this high degree of knowledge. I recalled the words of God Almighty:

Have they not travelled throughout the land so their hearts may reason, and their ears may listen? Indeed, it is not the eyes that are blind, but it is the hearts in the chests that grow blind. (Hajj: 46).

God also said:

.. They have hearts they do not understand with, eyes they do not see with, and ears they do not hear with. They are like cattle. In fact, they are even less guided! Such ˹people˺ are ˹entirely˺ heedless. (Al-A’raf: 179).

I said to him:

Do you look at the tree to focus on your absent father? The tree has nothing to do with your father.

How about God Almighty? The difference is vast between these weak statues and God the Mighty, the Owner, the King, possessed of might and honor.

I also said:

In any way, is this a kind of focus or distraction? If the worship of idols is for focus only, why do you take care of them and decorate them, spend thousands of money on them, and come to worship them from faraway places?

A person may think of an issue to the point where he forgets about everything around him, even though he does not have a moral image.

When God placed the need of worshiping Him in human instinct, He guided him to the way of worship through the prophets and messengers. He did not leave them at their whims to do what they wanted.

God causes man to be begotten out of the essence of a humble fluid. So, what is the purpose of man’s existence?

How can he communicate with his Creator?

What is his fate after death?

These questions can’t be answered according to man’s reasoning and comprehension without the guidance of God Almighty.

Islam has dealt with this problem. Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him says what means:

Perfection in the prayer can be achieved by worshipping God as if you see Him. If you cannot achieve this state of devotion then you must consider that He is watching you.” (Sahih Al-Bukhari).

Then the Hindu said:

Life return to the idols after reciting the hymns.

I said:

This is an illusion. This has nothing to do with the truth.

If we accept for the sake of argument that life returns to them after reciting the hymns, then they start to walk, speak and act as they want. Can then a person create life in the first place? So far, none of your scholars has claimed to restore life to something which has no life.

In fact, benefit and harm are by the Will of God Almighty. Therefore, whoever thinks that these statues can benefit him is delusional.

He said:

Have not you seen through satellite channels the statues’ tears, and the flowers scattered from their hands?

I told him:

I am surprised by a man in your scientific position who believes in these methods of deception. These methods are done only to earn money by deceiving people.

The Creator responds to these:

O humanity! A lesson is set forth, so listen to it ˹carefully˺: those ˹idols˺ you invoke besides Allah can never create ˹so much as˺ a fly, even if they ˹all˺ were to come together for that. And if a fly were to snatch anything away from them, they cannot ˹even˺ retrieve it from the fly. How powerless are those who invoke and those invoked!1 (Hajj: 73)

It is very wrong to introduce Islam by saying: Islam means to believe in one God, and just stop there. We have to explain, to give more depth.

Islam means to believe in One God and to have a direct connection with God who is the Creator. Nothing is like Him.

He does not come to earth in any animal form or human form, He has no image known to humans. Our minds can only imagine objects, people, and situations based on past experiences and memories. God is beyond our perception and cannot be comprehended.

Whenever we sin, we repent to Him directly. When we have a problem, we ask Him to solve the problem directly. When we feel blessed, we have to thank Him directly, because the faith in One God already exists in many religions.

In fact, it was even the faith of the disbelievers of the tribe of Prophet Muhammad. They believed in One God. When they were asked about worshiping the idols, they said they worship idols to make them closer to God. So, their problem was not with the faith in One God. Their problem was with having a direct connection with Him.

The Creator said:

Indeed, sincere devotion is due ˹only˺ to Allah. As for those who take other lords besides Him, ˹saying,˺ “We worship them only so they may bring us closer to Allah,” surely Allah will judge between all regarding what they differed about. Allah certainly does not guide whoever persists in lying and disbelief. (Al-Zumar:3).

This was all due to ignorance of the true concept of the Creator, which led to confusion of minds and thus, the resort to atheism.

Let’s imagine that it is rumored among people that the writer of this article has reached the moon and roamed space, so whoever knows her well will not believe this information and will make fun of her because they know very well that she is afraid of boarding a plane.

God has the highest example, so whoever knows the true attributes of God will not believe these human and animal attributes were ascribed to him.

Causation is a law for us who live in space and time. God, who created space and time, is necessarily transcendent in relation to both and it is an error on our part to think that He is bound by either. It is God who created the law of causation and we cannot consider Him as a subject to the law He created, therefore God does not change. He created the time, so He is not subjected to time.

God does not go through the same stages of time that we go through, does not get tired, and does not need to put Himself in a physical form or descend to Earth.

Therefore, we cannot see God in this life because we are trapped in time and space, while He transcends both. 

For example, a person sitting in a windowless room can only see the room’s interior. To see outside, he must leave the room; that is to say, he must overcome the room as a hindrance to seeing the outside.

Although the Creator is all-powerful, He does not do what does not fit His majesty, exalted be He above that.

God has the ideal: even though a high-ranking cleric can go out in public naked, he does not do so, because this behavior is not befitting his religious position.

Existence as we see it (the universe and man) must be fully understood by who created it. Therefore, the Creator’s attributes must not be on the same level or lower than the attributes of His creations.

Absolute Perfection is the attribute of the Absolute Generator. Who absorbs all existence. Who creates and directs its laws.

The path to knowing the Creator begins with knowing the human himself (who knows himself knows his Lord).

It is only after having realized the greatness of the creator who created the human soul and this cosmic existence, we fully realize that all that exist are incomplete and limited compared to the creative Creator.

Therefore, our qualities are different than the qualities of our Creator.

God said:

Say, ˹O Prophet,˺ “He is Allah—One ˹and Indivisible˺; Allah—the Sustainer ˹needed by all˺. He has never had offspring, nor was He born. And there is none comparable to Him.” (Al-Ikhlas)

We understand from the above:

  • The Creator does not come to earth in any human form, animal, or idol.
  • Humans must worship Him directly without a priest, a saint, idol, or any other intermediary.

Notes:

The Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Middle East use the word “Allah” to refer to God, which refers to The Only True God. The word Allah was mentioned in the earlier version of the Old Testament 89 times. (Refer to Genesis 2:4, Book of Daniel 6:20 Hebrew and Arabic Bible). The word ‘Allah’ appears in the original Sanskrit text. (Reg Veda – Book 2 hymn 1, Verse 11).

The reference of God to Himself as WE or US in many verses of the Qur’an denotes Grandeur and Power in Arabic. In the English language, this is known as the royal WE, where a plural pronoun is used to refer to a single person holding a high office, such as a monarch. For the avoidance of doubt, the Qur’an has consistently reminded us of the SINGULAR pronoun in reference to God, when called upon by His servants.

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