Does God's power, related to possibilities, mean that creatures are also capable of everything within the realm of the possible, and that God is not capable of things He created, such as undoing past events or setting an end to numbers? And is the impossibility of combining opposites confined to God, not including creatures, despite God combining two opposites in the story of Abraham, where He made the fire cool for him and hot for others at the same time?
Divine power relates to possibilities, and the impossible is not something to which power relates, because it is merely a mental construct, and it is not proper for power to relate to it at all. For Allah, the Almighty, is capable of all things, and the absoluteness of His power relates to whatever can truly be called a "thing." As for what is not a thing, such as the combination of opposites, power does not relate to it.
By possibilities, we mean what is not inherently impossible, and no one among creation can achieve this except Allah alone. Similarly, annulling past events is impossible due to the impossibility of combining opposites.
Therefore, the statement that the impossibility of combining contradictions is limited to Allah and available to created beings is false. This notion may be a result of obsessive thoughts (waswasa).
Summary from Ftawy's records · added here
Reviewed by El Fatwa's sharia committee.
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- Summary from Ftawy's records, reviewed by El Fatwa's sharia committee.
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