Tajdeed

The Necessary Being Argument from the Qur’an

(Qur’an 30:50)
“So look at the effects of Allah’s mercy: how He gives life to the earth after its lifelessness. Indeed, that is the one who gives life to the dead, and He is capable of everything.”

This verse is one of the rational reminders that God is the Truth.

All Glory be To Allah, the one who has bestowed rational thinking and consciousness to mankind. All thanks to God who has granted us life and existence despite us not needing to do. This blessing of existing is out of His grace and infinite mercy. Evidently, mercy is the cause of all this beauty.

Through the intellect, we are able to see the signs and blessings of God. And those who reject the signs of God, reject the use of the Divinely given blessed faculty of reason and intellect.

Indeed, God intends for you to submit to the truth despite not witnessing extraordinary things like angels or directly receiving revelation. Instead, He wants you to come to the Truth through the signs, the indications that has God given you. Certainly, God wants you to connect to Him as a test through the use of the heart and the mind.

This verse 30:50 reminds us that God has given life and existence to everything without Him not needing to do so.

And this is precisely why this is verse is one of the proof of God’s existence in the Qur’an and it can be an indication to the philosophical Contingency or Necessary Being argument.

The verse explains that God brings life from lifelessness which means the existence of the entities of the universe do not need to exist, instead they depended on something else for their cause, existence, survival and their continual.

In turn, what this means is that they are contingent entities. The definition of contingency is that its existence is not necessary, it depends on other effects for its cause and it depends on other things for its survival and continuation.

“Or were they created by nothing, or were they the creators [of themselves]?”
(Surah At-Tur 52:35)

It is impossible for contingent entities like the human being, or even the sun, the moon and the stars or even water to create themselves, nor is it possible that they came into existence from non-existence because nothing can never create something.

So, the question arises, if everything within existence is like this, then why does anything exist in the first place?

Otherwise, we would have an infinite chain of dependent contingent entities that all depend on each other (contingent things) but this is paradoxical. An infinite number of contingent beings all depending on another is logically and mathematically impossible!

So, why do these contingent beings exist if they do not need to exist? It is because this chain of contingency or possible, dependent entities are finite and they all go back to the Necessary Being, which is the true infinity because the Necessary Being has no beginning. Verily, the Necessary Existent always existed, which is why this Eternal Being has no beginning, nor does He have an end.

“He is the First and the Last, the Ascendant and the Intimate, and He is, of all things, Knowing.”
(Surah Al-Hadid 57:3)

Everything in the universe depends on another contingent thing and all of these contingent things or entities ultimately all depend on the First Cause, which is the Necessary Being. the truth is that the Necessary Being is God Almighty. They all depend on Him for their causation and continuation.

“O mankind, you are those in need of Allah, while Allah is the Free of need, the Praiseworthy.”
(Surah Fatir 35:15)

“Allah! There is no deity except Him, the Ever-Living, the Sustainer of [all] existence.”
(Surah Al-Baqarah 2:255)

Now, some may ask why is there One Necessary Being instead of multiple eternal entities?

An equally valid question to this question would be, why would there need to be multiple “necessary” entities?

The answer to this is given from the Book of Allah

“If there had been within the heavens and earth gods besides Allah, they both would have been ruined…”
(Surah Al-Anbiya 21:22)

“Say, ‘If there had been with Him [other] gods, as they say, then they would have sought to the Owner of the Throne a way.’”
(Surah Al-Isra 17:42)

What these verses are explaining is that what makes the Necessary Being different from all other possible or dependent existents (contingency) is that the Necessary Existent is Eternal, the Necessary Being always existed, and needs to exist by necessity and does not need anything because God’s essence is self-sufficient which means that God is all-powerful and as the verse teaches us.

Therefore, the Necessary Existent being All-Powerful is a necessary attribute for it to truly be necessary.

‘Say Allah is Ahad (absolutely One/indivisible), Allah is Samad (Completely perfect, Self-Sufficient, Indivisible, United)
(Surah al-Ikhlaas 112:1-2)

How can there be multiple all-powerful beings? If there power is the same, then how are they truly different and why is there more than one in the first place? If one is more powerful than the other then this implies that the overpowered one has some intrinsic limitations in its essence, which implies contingency, which then shows that it is not necessary in of itself because it cannot manifest or enact its will properly.

Therefore, the Necessary Being is completely One and is self-sufficient, independent and not it need of anything and He can absolutely enact His will completely without any restriction.

By Abul Hasan al-Gabikani al-Shadi al-Shaddadi al-Hadhabani -al-Kurdi