and all your deeds,” this would not have been fitting. For He condemned them for their worship—which was one of their deeds—so mentioning that He created their deeds would have had no bearing on the condemnation; rather, it would have been closer to providing them with an excuse.

Nevertheless, this verse proves from another angle that He is the Creator of the deeds(1) of His servants: if He created the manufactured object they made—namely, the carved idol—then He also created the composition inhering in it. That composition resulted from(2) the deed of a human being, and the Creator of the effect(3) is, a fortiori, the Creator of its cause.

This is like His statement:

“And We created for them the likes of it, on which they ride.”

[Surah Yā Sīn: 42]

It is well known that human beings shape(4) the timber of ships and assemble them. Ships are therefore made by them(5), just as(6) idols are made by them. The same applies to everything else they produce, including clothing(7), food, and buildings. Since Allah has stated that He created the laden ship and made it one of His signs and one of the blessings He bestowed upon His servants, it is known that He is the Creator of their actions.

According to the Qadarites, however, He created nothing but the timber, which could be made into ships or into other things. Yet it is well known that merely creating the material does not entail creating the form produced by human actions if He is not the Creator(8) of that form.