He Originated the Creation With Omniscience

Article 19. Khalaqa al-khalqa bi-ʿilmihi: He originated the creation with omniscience.

Wa qaddara lahum aqdārā: He measured out the lots of all He created.

So He originated the creation based on the knowledge that He had. Again, it should be remembered that His knowledge has encompassed everything from eternity. The question that arises is: how do these attributes act with one another? What is the relationship between them? Again, there is knowledge, there is the will, there is the creation. It cannot really be said that this comes first, this comes second, this comes third. In a sense, it can be said that ʿilm, which He has always had, is going to be before the created association of creation, because the created association of creating comes later on, after the eternal one. But in terms of His ability from eternity to create something, the relationship of that with His will, which is also eternal, and His ʿilm, which is also eternal — it is very difficult to say that one comes before the other, because we are not privy to these things. This is Allah (swt) who is being spoken about.

But as al-Maydānī explains, He created the creation with His ability, bi-qudratihi, with His qudrah, when His will became associated with it. This means that when Allah (swt) willed the thing to come into existence, then it came into existence. Through His knowledge: Allah had knowledge of what He was creating before He created it. It is not something He does at random, that He tries out. No, it is something where He knows what He is doing, and what is going to happen when He does it; He knows all of that. It is not a trial-and-error type of work that He does; it is absolute. He knows exactly what is going to happen, and why He is doing it.

And then he says: wa qaddara lahum aqdārā — and likewise, He measured out the lots of all that He created. That means: whether it is going to be good, whether it is going to be bad, how it is going to be taken, how long it is going to be.