Causality

AodhubiLlahi min ash-shaytanir-rajeem. BismiLlahir-Rahmanir-Raheem
AlHamduLillah was-Salaatu was-Salaamu ‘alaa Rasul Allah

“Wonder is the first passion.” – Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad (Tim Winter), Contentions 1:94

Wonder.

Cause and effect. It just makes you wonder.

How perfect is Allah’s creation, the order He has originated and maintained. The sequence of causes and effects that He creates. It brings tears to one’s eyes just thinking about it. Imagine how 13.7 billion years ago, a number too large for our minds to even grasp, He created the entire cosmos out of nothing. From a state of non-existence, everything comes into being, and a chain of events is initiated that leads to the formation of the first electrons and other sub-atomic particles.

Then these come together to form the first atoms – all of the atoms that we would ever need, formed eons ago in an age of uninhabitable, unfathomable heat. All the atoms that make up my body, and your body. When there’s nothing in the Universe except trillions of degrees of heat and energy. All of the atoms – the carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, sulfur – that would make us, all the animals, the Sun, the stars, the beautiful Night Sky. Everything is made up of those atoms, that came into being so many billions of years ago.

Then these atoms come together. God is Creator of both cause and effect. The gravity He created becomes the cause of atoms coming together. Then growing larger and larger… becoming supercharged… and stars are born.

“The doctrine of ‘ ada demands the existence of a defensible secular explanation of nature. Such an explanation thus becomes a mercy. Without it, there is only anomie and alienation.” — Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad (Tim Winters), Contentions 1:65

As brother Dawud Israel writes, quoting the Shaykh AHM himself, in explanation of the above Contention:

Ada is God’s custom, sometimes known as Sunnat Allah. It refers to the normal sequence of ‘cause and effect’ –  a sword causes a wound. The reality is that God Alone is the efficient cause. Hence miracles are possible; and in a sense everything is equally a miracle, since He is not bound by ‘physical laws’. Still, His custom creates the impression that causality is real, rather as quantum mechanics denies natural causality, but produces a universe in which its appearance is solid. Without the ‘user-interface’ of an apparently real causality, our minds cannot operate. Hence it is a mercy. – Dawud Israel (https://muslimology.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/shaykh-abdal-hakim-murads-commentary-on-difficult-contentions/)

The gravity of these Stars causes dust to gather around them. One Star is Chosen, our Al-Shams, our Sun, Sol. It gathers the dust around it, trapping it within its gravitational field. The particles of dust clump together to form chunks.

Just look at how Allah causes the growth of what He wills. From molecules of dust, they become chunks, then rocks, then cliffs, then mountains, then gigantic meteors, then condense into spherical shapes and keep growing until they form planets. The apparently real cause: Gravity; the Absolutely Real Cause: Allah.

One of these planets is chosen – at the right distance from the Sun, with all the right concentrations of those very same elements and atoms created eons ago. Water, land, then plants are created, they trap energy from the same Sun that formed the planet they grow on. This energy is transferred to the animals by the process of feeding;  an entire Ecosystem is formed – the balance of which, more delicate than a rose’s petals.

{ إِنَّ رَبَّكُمُ ٱللَّهُ ٱلَّذِي خَلَقَ ٱلسَمَٰوَٰتِ وَٱلأَرْضَ فِي سِتَّةِ أَيَّامٍ ثُمَّ ٱسْتَوَىٰ عَلَى ٱلْعَرْشِ يُغْشِي ٱلَّيلَ ٱلنَّهَارَ يَطْلُبُهُ حَثِيثاً وَٱلشَّمْسَ وَٱلْقَمَرَ وَٱلنُّجُومَ مُسَخَّرَاتٍ بِأَمْرِهِ أَلاَ لَهُ ٱلْخَلْقُ وَٱلأَمْرُ تَبَارَكَ ٱللَّهُ رَبُّ ٱلْعَالَمِينَ }
Your Guardian-Lord is Allah, Who created the heavens and the earth in six days, and is firmly established on the throne (of authority): He draweth the night as a veil o’er the day, each seeking the other in rapid succession: He created the sun, the moon, and the stars, (all) governed by laws under His command. Is it not His to create and to govern? Blessed be Allah, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the worlds!

[Qur’an 7:54  intepretation of the meaning, Yusuf Ali]

From the complex metabolic reactions within a single cell to the coordination of the physiological systems – how eating too much sugar, causes the presence of sugar in the blood, which causes the production of Insulin to send those sugars into cells, and when the sugars are sent into cells, their blood concentration falls, and so the ‘button’ pressing Insulin is turned off and its secretion decreases, maintaining the sugar concentration at a steady state; sugar too much -> more Insulin -> sugar becomes less -> less Insulin … one of the hundreds of millions of miracles, Divinely-orchestrated causes and effects – that simultaneously sustain a single Human, out of the billions of Humans and mammals alive today; for a single moment. And on and on… until an appointed term.

A Universe up there, and a Universe within us… all of it, working perfectly, at the same time… such beautiful harmony, such unimaginable symphony…

{ سَنُرِيهِمْ آيَاتِنَا فِي ٱلآفَاقِ وَفِيۤ أَنفُسِهِمْ حَتَّىٰ يَتَبَيَّنَ لَهُمْ أَنَّهُ ٱلْحَقُّ أَوَلَمْ يَكْفِ بِرَبِّكَ أَنَّهُ عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ شَهِيدٌ }

We shall show them Our signs in the horizons, in all the regions of the heavens and the earth, in the way of the luminous celestial bodies, the varieties of vegetation and trees, and in their own souls, in the way of the exquisite craftsmanship and unique wisdom [inherent in their creation], until it becomes clear to them that it, namely, the Qur’ān and the Prophet ﷺ, is the truth, revealed by God, informing of the Resurrection, the Reckoning and the Punishment, so that they [realise that they] will be punished for their disbelief in it and in the one who has come with it... But is it not sufficient concerning Your ﷺ Lord that He is, over all things, a Witness?

[Qur’an 41:53 – interpretation of the meaning Tafsir al-Jalalayn and Yusuf Ali]

And may Allah’s blessings (salawat) and peace (salam) be upon the Source of Beauty, the Last of the Anbiya, the Noblest of the Messengers, our Liegelord Muhammad ﷺ, the Best of Creation; and upon His Pure House and Guided Companions, permanently, increasing, eternally, forever. Allahumma Ameen.

Mawlaya Salli wa Sallim da’iman ‘abadan ‘alaa Habeebika Khayr il-Khalqi Kullihimi.