Human Freedom and Responsibility
Actions are either voluntary or involuntary. The difference between them is not of kind but of degree. Analyse the the process of an involuntary action and you will find that if, for example, a man intends to thrust a needle in your eye or draws a sword to strike on your head, your eye in the former case will at once close and in the latter your hand will suddenly be raised up to shield your head. This prompt action on the part of your eye and hand is due to your consciousness of the evil to be evaded, and this gives rise to volition which moves the eye and the hand without the least delay. There are, however, cases the desirability or rejection of which needs meditation, but the moment mind decides, the decision is carried out as promptly as in the above example. This meditation translated into choice or rejection constitutes will. Now will makes its choice between two alternatives and takes its cue either from imagination or reason. For example, a man may be unable to cut his own throat, not because his hand is weak or a knife is not available, but because will is lacking which would give the stimulus to suicide. For man loves his own life. But suppose he gets tired of his life, owing to having harrowing pains and unbearable mental sufferings. He has now to choose between two alternatives which are both undesirable A struggle commences and he hangs between life and death. If he thinks that death which will put an end to his sufferings quickly is preferable to life with its lingering intolerable pains, he will choose death although he loves his life. This choice gives rise to will, the command to which, communicated through proper channels, would then be faithfully executed by his hand in the manner of suicide. Thus, though the process from the commencement of mental struggle for the choice between too alternatives down to the stimulus to physical action is uniformly determinate there is at any rate a sort of freedom tracable in the will.
Man holds the balance between determinism and freedom. The uniform succession of events is on the lines of determination but his choice which is an essential element of will is his own. Our Ulamas have therefore coined a separate phrase: Kasb (acquisition), distinguishing it from Jabr (necessity) and Ikhtiyar (freedom) They say that fire burns of necessity (Jabr) but man may acquire fire through the appropriate methods, while in Almighty God is the ultimate cause of fire (Ikhtiyar). But it must be noted that when we use the word Ikhtiyar for God, we must exclude the notion of choice, which is an essential element of will in man. Let it be here recognised once for all as a general principle that all the words of man’s vocabulary when used for God’s attributes are similarly metaphorical.
The question may be asked: If God is the ultimate cause why should there be a causal connection in the orderly succession of events? The answer to this lies in the correct understanding of the nature of causation. Nothing causes anything. Antecedents have consequents. God alone is the efficient cause, but the ignorant have misunderstood and misapplied the word power. As to the orderly succession of events, let it be understood that the two events are conjoined like the relation between the condition and the conditioned. Now certain conditions are very apparent and can be known easily by people of little understanding, but there are conditions which are understood only by those who see through the light of intuition: hence the common error of miscalculating the uniformity of events. There is a divine purpose linking the antecedents to the consequents and manifesting itself in the existing orderly succession of events, without the least break or irregularity. “Verily”, says the Quran. “We did not create the heavens and the earth and what is between them in sport. We did not create them both but with truth, but most of them do not know”.