Theology and Creed

God’s power is unlimited, is identical with His essence, and is free from every defect and imperfection. God is capable of doing all things; yet, because His essence is absolute beauty and perfection, He never does anything that entails evil or ugliness, or is futile and purposeless. Divine power operates within the bounds of wisdom, what is in the best interests of creation, justice, and benevolence.

The narration “Indeed, God, Blessed and Exalted, is beyond His creation, and His creation is beyond Him” means that there is no likeness between the Creator and the created. God is not like any created being, nor is any created being like God. Everything other than God is created, and God is the Creator of all things. We use the word “name” in speaking of God because created beings have no other way to relate to Him; it does not mean that God needs the attributes of created beings.

Divine punishment is a reflection of a person’s own actions and choices, and its nature corresponds to their deeds, thoughts, and intentions. Just as a seed grows into a plant shaped by the soil and climate around it, in the next life people will take forms that correspond to the actions and thoughts they have cultivated in this world.

The noble verse «و لقد خلقنا الإنسان و نعلم ما توسوس به نفسه و نحن أقرب إلیه من حبل الورید» tells us that God is closer to us than our jugular vein. “God stands between us and His own vein” means that God transcends life and all that exists. The sense of servitude that comes from Him is greater than life itself, and its sweetness cannot be compared with anything else.

Feng shui is a Chinese approach to home design and arrangement that functions like an ancient, quasi-philosophical ritual. Aimed at creating harmony, it seeks to attract positive and negative energies and can resemble the use of talismans, sorcery, or even an advanced form of idolatry. Belief in luck and reliance on supernatural forces in this practice conflict with Islamic principles. China’s scientific progress has nothing to do with it.

Prayer is performed to draw closer to God—not to absorb prana or the four energies, open the chakras, or ward off negative energy. The intention of seeking closeness to God and His pleasure connects a person to the sacred majesty. Anyone who prays for other purposes does so without sincerity. Any attempt to match the parts of the body that touch the ground in prostration with the chakras is utterly false.

Divine knowledge has no beginning in time or space, because having a beginning means arising within time and space, and a being bound by time and space cannot comprehend what is without beginning. We can gain some understanding of limitless knowledge by looking beyond the confines of time and space. God’s knowledge is free of quantity, quality, and limits, and precedes the divine will and intention.

God’s existence is essential, and created beings do not share in His existence. If we deny that created beings have non-essential existence, we fall into disbelief. And if we regard God’s existence as having parts, one of which is shared by created beings, we have deprived the Divine Essence of its unity.

All the Infallibles (AS) guide people to the Exalted Truth; this title is not exclusive to Imam Husayn (AS). “The Guide to the Essence of God” means directing creation toward the One, Absolute Essence. For the divine Essence, considered in itself, is beyond our reach. Through their very being, the Infallibles (AS) serve as a means of directing us toward it—just as we call upon God by His names.

God, blessed and exalted, possesses Names and Attributes. But we must not identify what belongs to God with God Himself, just as the heavens and the earth belong to God, yet the Divine Essence cannot be identified with them. The fact that the Most Beautiful Names belong exclusively to the Divine Essence affirms His sovereignty; it does not mean that the Essence is identical with a Name. Worshipping the Names and Attributes instead of the Essence is outright unbelief and shirk, because a name is distinct from the one named.

Neither human beings nor any other created being possesses power or strength in its own right. All abilities are entrusted to creation by the will and power of God. Whether limited or extensive, they depend entirely on God’s power. The difference between the power of created beings and God’s power is that God is the true possessor of power; the abilities of created beings are manifest only for as long as God wills.

This response considers whether one may pray for the death of God’s oppressive servants. It explains that, for those who hold no hope of being guided and whose continued existence brings nothing but sin and corruption, praying for their death may itself be a special act of mercy. Supplication 27 of al-Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya offers a beautiful model for prayers concerning oppressors.

A critique of a talk on prayer and healing, highlighting a contradiction in the speaker’s claims that divine destiny cannot change yet can be affected by prayer. The true nature of prayer includes asking for things not yet decreed and seeking changes to what has already been firmly decreed. The supplication of Laylat al-Qadr is one example.

The Qur’an describes God as al-Wakīl—the Creator and Sustainer of all things. Nothing in the universe can have an effect except by His permission and will. God’s being al-Wakīl means that created beings’ intentions and actions can come to fruition only through Him. Everything in existence depends on Him in every aspect of its being; without Him, nothing could come to be.

If we regard existence as having the same meaning when applied to the Creator and the created, this would undermine the oneness of existence and lead us to regard the Creator and the created as one. This view multiplies the oneness of existence, extending it to as many instances as there are creatures—and thereby destroys belief in God’s oneness.

The Greater Self is the “I” that reflects the divine majesty of God. This “I” is a choosing, free-willing self, capable of the highest excellence in its exercise of choice; through choosing rightly, it becomes one whom God has chosen.

The Most Beautiful Names are the “I’s” crowning adornment, shaping its path, actions and very existence. They guide human existence and manifest divine majesty within it.

The “I,” like every other being, has need of none but God Most High. Though the Wise Creator has woven bonds and connections among His creatures, drawing them together, the “I,” free of every attachment, knows only Him—and none other.

The abode of the “I” must lie beyond the horizons of the world, for the world rests beneath the “I” like a flight of steps. This is a metaphorical way of expressing the “I”’s transcendent position in relation to the material world.

Appearances and characters belong to the “I” and are considered among its outward veils. In other words, appearance and character are not the “I” itself; they are things that belong to it and coverings that veil it.