Evidence of God's Existence?
By Mustafa McPherson
I believe that there is no direct verifiable scientific proof that God (Allah, glorified and exalted is He) exists. By this I mean that no one has ever seen, smelled or touched Him.
Moses conversed with Him through the burning bush, but we don't have a tape recording of the conversation.
No one has measured or defined His nature other than what He has revealed in the Quran. Belief in Allah is the most fundamental belief that Muslims have.
My belief in Allah centers on the requirement I see for a Creator. This perceived need of a Creator is derived from my scientific knowledge (PhD in genetics and molecular biology, as Allah has willed) and through the use of my mind to know that the universe and all life did not arise by chance, but rather was created by a Higher Power that I know as Allah.
It is my choice to believe in Allah as it is the choice of others to disbelieve.
Faith & Logical Thinking
I will use an analogy for a reason why I believe Allah exists:
If I was to walk upon a beach and came upon three bricks _ _ _ that were stacked on top of each other perfectly aligned like:
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|
|
I would conclude that someone came before me and stacked them up in that manner.
The fact that there were no footprints left in the sand would not be proof that I was wrong and that the bricks instead became stacked by the random crashing of the waves on the shoreline. Rather I would conclude that the waves erased the footprints of the person who stacked the bricks while leaving the bricks standing. How much more intricate is the design of life systems and species of life that are evidence of a Creator?
A fundamental aspect and element of any religion by definition is faith. If we had physically verifiable evidence or proof for the existence of Allah, where would faith come in? If there existed such evidence observable to all, could anyone deny the existence of Allah?
According to Wikipedia, Faith is confidence or trust in a person or entity. Depending on the religion, faith is belief in a single god or multiple gods or in the doctrines or teachings of the religion. Informal usage of faith can be quite broad, including trust or belief without proof, and "faith" is often used as a substitute for "hope", "trust" or "belief".
Some critics of faith have argued that faith is opposed to reason. In contrast, some advocates of faith argue that the proper domain of faith concerns questions which cannot be settled by evidence.
Santa Claus & Paradigm Shifts
I grew up as a Christian, and as a child I believed that Santa Claus brought presents to me during the night before Christmas.
As I grew older my curiosity and questioning about Santa Claus also grew. I would stay up and try to get a glimpse of Santa Claus, but I never did. Eventually, I came to see that he was only a myth and that it was my parents who put the presents under the tree while I was asleep. I ceased to believe that Santa Claus existed.Also, as a child of Christians, I grew up being taught that God came to earth in the form of a human being, Jesus, to live a perfect life and to offer himself as a sacrificial lamb on the cross as the only possible means for man, myself included, to be redeemed from his sins and saved from being punished in the Hellfire.
My concept of God was centered around and focused on the 'Son' aspect of the Trinity and I felt an immense gratitude that God would come to earth and die a horrible death so that I might attain Eternal Life.
I continued with this Christian belief until I read the Quran and came upon a different understanding of God as the one and only Divine Being without father, mother, son or daughter. I experienced a 'Paradigm Shift' where my concept of God changed irrevocably.
I saw that God was the 'Father' alone who Jesus referred to in the Lord's Prayer and who he prayed to in the Garden of Gethsemane. My belief about Jesus changed as I now saw that Jesus was an honored Prophet and servant of God and that he was not God incarnate. This radical change in belief was not something that I willed to occur; rather I feel I was guided to this Truth by Allah.
Atheists are actually quite insightful in seizing upon the Theory of Evolution as the explanation for how the existing and extinct species of life came into being. If it can be proven that all of the species of life, including mankind, arose through natural processes from a single, unicellular 'Common Ancestor', then there is little need for a Creator to have created them from nothing merely by saying "Be!"
If a Creator can be proven not to be required for the emergence of the species, then the most basic, fundamental element of faith that is the cornerstone of religion would be shown to be nothing more than a myth like Santa Claus. As a result religion would collapse like a 'house of cards'.
My contention is that the atheists and the evolutionists will never be successful and that they are merely grasping at imaginary straws in a futile attempt to disprove the existence of Allah.
The All-Knowing, the All-Powerful
We, as theists, should be thankful to Allah (or substitute whatever term you use for the ‘uncaused Cause for all that exists’) for this guidance that results in us having faith while others yet wander astray. Our faith is an intangible element of our being that to a large extent defines our worldview.
Like Christians and Jews, Muslims also believe in the All-Knowing, All-Powerful Divine Being mentioned in the first part of "The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus…" Muslims refer to the God of Abraham as Allah, while Christians refer to Him as the Father, and the Jews refer to Him as YHWH, or Yahweh. The terms Yahweh, Father and Allah all refer to the 'God of Abraham'.
Neither the Muslims nor the Jews believe that Jesus was the Son of God, or God Incarnate. Muslims believe that Jesus (Isa in Arabic) was born supernaturally to the virgin Mary, that he was an honored Prophet and messenger of Allah, that he ascended to Heaven without dying, and that he will return to reign as the Messiah during the Last Days before Judgment Day.
Pure and simple, Muslims pray 5 times a day to the same God who spoke to Moses through the Burning Bush and who Jesus prayed to in the Garden of Gethsemane.
I believe that there is no direct verifiable scientific proof that God (Allah, glorified and exalted is He) exists. By this I mean that no one has ever seen, smelled or touched Him.
Moses conversed with Him through the burning bush, but we don't have a tape recording of the conversation.
No one has measured or defined His nature other than what He has revealed in the Quran. Belief in Allah is the most fundamental belief that Muslims have.
My belief in Allah centers on the requirement I see for a Creator. This perceived need of a Creator is derived from my scientific knowledge (PhD in genetics and molecular biology, as Allah has willed) and through the use of my mind to know that the universe and all life did not arise by chance, but rather was created by a Higher Power that I know as Allah.
It is my choice to believe in Allah as it is the choice of others to disbelieve.
Faith & Logical Thinking
I will use an analogy for a reason why I believe Allah exists:
If I was to walk upon a beach and came upon three bricks _ _ _ that were stacked on top of each other perfectly aligned like:
|
|
|
I would conclude that someone came before me and stacked them up in that manner.
The fact that there were no footprints left in the sand would not be proof that I was wrong and that the bricks instead became stacked by the random crashing of the waves on the shoreline. Rather I would conclude that the waves erased the footprints of the person who stacked the bricks while leaving the bricks standing. How much more intricate is the design of life systems and species of life that are evidence of a Creator?
A fundamental aspect and element of any religion by definition is faith. If we had physically verifiable evidence or proof for the existence of Allah, where would faith come in? If there existed such evidence observable to all, could anyone deny the existence of Allah?
According to Wikipedia, Faith is confidence or trust in a person or entity. Depending on the religion, faith is belief in a single god or multiple gods or in the doctrines or teachings of the religion. Informal usage of faith can be quite broad, including trust or belief without proof, and "faith" is often used as a substitute for "hope", "trust" or "belief".
Some critics of faith have argued that faith is opposed to reason. In contrast, some advocates of faith argue that the proper domain of faith concerns questions which cannot be settled by evidence.
Santa Claus & Paradigm Shifts
I grew up as a Christian, and as a child I believed that Santa Claus brought presents to me during the night before Christmas.
As I grew older my curiosity and questioning about Santa Claus also grew. I would stay up and try to get a glimpse of Santa Claus, but I never did. Eventually, I came to see that he was only a myth and that it was my parents who put the presents under the tree while I was asleep. I ceased to believe that Santa Claus existed.Also, as a child of Christians, I grew up being taught that God came to earth in the form of a human being, Jesus, to live a perfect life and to offer himself as a sacrificial lamb on the cross as the only possible means for man, myself included, to be redeemed from his sins and saved from being punished in the Hellfire.
My concept of God was centered around and focused on the 'Son' aspect of the Trinity and I felt an immense gratitude that God would come to earth and die a horrible death so that I might attain Eternal Life.
I continued with this Christian belief until I read the Quran and came upon a different understanding of God as the one and only Divine Being without father, mother, son or daughter. I experienced a 'Paradigm Shift' where my concept of God changed irrevocably.
I saw that God was the 'Father' alone who Jesus referred to in the Lord's Prayer and who he prayed to in the Garden of Gethsemane. My belief about Jesus changed as I now saw that Jesus was an honored Prophet and servant of God and that he was not God incarnate. This radical change in belief was not something that I willed to occur; rather I feel I was guided to this Truth by Allah.
Atheists are actually quite insightful in seizing upon the Theory of Evolution as the explanation for how the existing and extinct species of life came into being. If it can be proven that all of the species of life, including mankind, arose through natural processes from a single, unicellular 'Common Ancestor', then there is little need for a Creator to have created them from nothing merely by saying "Be!"
If a Creator can be proven not to be required for the emergence of the species, then the most basic, fundamental element of faith that is the cornerstone of religion would be shown to be nothing more than a myth like Santa Claus. As a result religion would collapse like a 'house of cards'.
My contention is that the atheists and the evolutionists will never be successful and that they are merely grasping at imaginary straws in a futile attempt to disprove the existence of Allah.
The All-Knowing, the All-Powerful
We, as theists, should be thankful to Allah (or substitute whatever term you use for the ‘uncaused Cause for all that exists’) for this guidance that results in us having faith while others yet wander astray. Our faith is an intangible element of our being that to a large extent defines our worldview.
Like Christians and Jews, Muslims also believe in the All-Knowing, All-Powerful Divine Being mentioned in the first part of "The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus…" Muslims refer to the God of Abraham as Allah, while Christians refer to Him as the Father, and the Jews refer to Him as YHWH, or Yahweh. The terms Yahweh, Father and Allah all refer to the 'God of Abraham'.
Neither the Muslims nor the Jews believe that Jesus was the Son of God, or God Incarnate. Muslims believe that Jesus (Isa in Arabic) was born supernaturally to the virgin Mary, that he was an honored Prophet and messenger of Allah, that he ascended to Heaven without dying, and that he will return to reign as the Messiah during the Last Days before Judgment Day.
Pure and simple, Muslims pray 5 times a day to the same God who spoke to Moses through the Burning Bush and who Jesus prayed to in the Garden of Gethsemane.