of polytheists?’

Then the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, stood to address them and said, ‘Indeed, every child is born upon a sound natural disposition, until he can express himself in speech.’”

His addressing them with this hadith immediately after forbidding them to kill the children of polytheists, and his saying to them, “Are not the best among you the children of polytheists?” show that he meant they were born without unbelief, and that unbelief arose only afterward.

Had he meant that a newborn is either an unbeliever or a Muslim at birth, according to what had already been decreed for him, his words would not have supported his intended purpose of forbidding them to kill the children of polytheists.

Some have supposed that his words, “Are not the best among you the children of polytheists?” mean that perhaps it was already known to Allah that, had those children survived, they would have believed, and that the prohibition therefore rests on allowing for this possibility.

But this is not the meaning of the hadith. Rather, it means that the best among you are the earliest forerunners among the Emigrants and the Helpers. They were children of polytheists: their fathers were unbelievers, but the sons subsequently embraced Islam. Thus, being the child of polytheists does not harm a child if he is a believer, for Allah recompenses him only for his own deeds, not those of his parents. He, glorified be He, brings forth the living from the dead and the dead from the living; He brings forth the believer from the unbeliever and the unbeliever from the believer.