Second:

Once it is established that Allah creates a person’s actions and inspires wickedness and righteousness, these actions are part of His creation. The doubt that arose among the Qadariyyah, concerning which the two men from Muzaynah questioned the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, relates specifically to human actions for which people are rewarded or punished. They did not deny, on grounds of predestination, that Allah decreed what He Himself creates before its existence. Those among them who denied this did so only when the matter of human actions became unclear to them.

These people say that Allah decrees things before they exist, except for human actions, felicity and wretchedness. They maintain that He should not know these until they occur, because they consider it reprehensible for a ruler to issue a command when he knows that the person charged with it will not obey him and that it will instead cause that person harm. Various authors writing on the principles of jurisprudence and other subjects have reported the Muʿtazilah’s disagreement on this point. They say:

“Allah may command a person to do something He knows that person will not do, contrary to the position of the Muʿtazilah.”

This is because some among the Muʿtazilah dispute this, although most do not; only one group among them disagrees.

Since the Quran establishes that He inspires the soul with its wickedness and its righteousness, these are part of what He brings into being. Thus, the Qadariyyah’s objection to His having decreed this before its existence no longer stands, just as they have no objection to His predetermining the entities and attributes He creates. As for those among the deniers of the divine attributes, or some of them, who deny His predetermination in knowledge, such people