Christ 2R Culture

Do Muslims Believe They Don't Have Free Will Or That Everything They Do Has Been Predicted?

July/11/2014 12:17 PM Filed in: World Religions
Muslims believe that Allah’s moral character is ultimately unknowable and his ways beyond understanding. They have know idea about God’s feelings towards them. Practically this means Muslims lack assurance of Allah’s forgiveness simply because they are not sure of Allah’s attitude towards them. Spend any time around Muslims and you will hear them use the phrase “In Sha Allah”, which means “if God wills.” In practice this means whatever happens is God’s will.

Muslims affirm that Allah leads astray whom he wills and he guides whom he wills (Surah 35:8). While the Quran lays great important on moral conduct, popular thinking is fatalistic.

For example, in July 1990, a total of 1,426 Muslim pilgrims in Mecca died when a tunnel collapsed. Many died when they were trampled to death by thousands of pilgrims trying to escape and others trying to enter the tunnel to find their loved ones. King Fahd of Saudi Arabia remarked in his news coverage of the story that this was God’s will.

While Christians believe God is sovereign over all things and will even uses evil for his glory, the Bible teaches we still make real choices and experience the blessings and consequences because of them. In addition, Christians know God’s character because he has revealed that in his word. God loves us so much he sent his son to die for us. Even in times of suffering we can rest assured that God will use evil for his glory. God’s will for us is not unknowable or capricious like the Allah of Islam.