What Is Meant by ‘The Plan of Allah’?


Answered by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani

Question

We do not attribute the concept of planning as the central religious principle about Allah Most High. Humans primarily employ planning to organize a course of action to achieve desired outcomes. Instead, what we firmly affirm regarding Allah is the existence of a divine decree and destiny. The divine decree encompasses what Allah Most High has ordained with His eternal will, transcending time in accordance with His infinite knowledge. This divine decree is known as Qada, the decree of Allah.

Shaykh Faraz Rabbani spent ten years studying with some of the leading scholars of recent times, first in Damascus and then in Amman, Jordan. His teachers include the foremost theologian of recent times in Damascus, the late Shaykh Adib al-Kallas (may Allah have mercy on him), as well as his student Shaykh Hassan al-Hindi, one of the leading Hanafi fuqaha of the present age. He returned to Canada in 2007, where he founded SeekersGuidance in order to meet the urgent need to spread Islamic knowledge–both online and on the ground–in a reliable, relevant, inspiring, and accessible manner. He is the author of Absolute Essentials of Islam: Faith, Prayer, and the Path of Salvation According to the Hanafi School (White Thread Press, 2004.) Since 2011, Shaykh Faraz has been named one of the 500 most influential Muslims by the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Center.