06 – The Universe Began to Exist

  Atheists object to the argument for God’s existence from design by asking the question, “Who designed the designer?” This objection is, in fact, a sound objection because the design argument in its common formulation by Christian theists is, in fact, flawed. But it is not a valid objection to the inferences that Muslim theologians […] The post 12: Who Designed the Designer? – Why Islam is True with Shaykh Hamza Karamali appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

Modern science has revealed that God can do anything. We have always discerned purposes in the universe–the purpose of our eyes is for us to see and the purpose of our ears is for us to hear. But modern science has delved deeper than ever before into these purposes to reveal a unimaginable, unfathomable, undeniable […] The post 11: Science Reveals God’s Unrestricted Agency – Why Islam is True with Shaykh Hamza Karamali appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

People have historically believed in two kinds of necessary being. Non-religious philosophers such as Aristotle and Avicenna argued for the existence of a necessary being who is the necessary and volitionless cause of the universe. Religious believers, on the other hand–Muslims, Christians, and Jews–have held that the necessary being who made the universe is someone […] The post 10 – God is a Volitional Agent appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

The beginning of the universe is evidence for the existence of a being that did not begin to exist, just as the contingency of the universe is evidence for the existence of a being that is not contingent. In this short episode, Shaykh Hamza recaps both of these arguments and concludes a series of presentations […] The post 09 – God Did Not Begin to Exist appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

  Through the SeekersGuidance Global Islamic Scholars Fund, SeekersGuidance Global has been able to help numerous scholars and students of knowledge in need to continue to study and serve their communities. Help is still urgently needed for a number of ongoing cases to help scholars and students of knowledge in need. Please donate today for […] The post Supporting Scholars and Students in Need – A Message from Shaykh Faraz Rabbani appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

The strongest objection to the “Kalam Cosmological Argument” hides behind the seemingly complex uses of various kinds of infinities in modern mathematics. In this episode, Shaykh Hamza explains the history and nature of modern mathematics, numbers, set theory, mathematical infinities, and the philosophy of mathematics, all in terms that anyone with a good high-school education […] The post 08 – Infinity is an Imaginary Concept appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

Muslim theologians formalized general Qur’anic arguments for the fact that the universe began to exist into precise philosophical arguments. Their arguments, historically unknown in the West, have only recently been introduced into contemporary philosophical discourse as the “Kalam Cosmological Argument”. In this episode, Shaykh Hamza explains the Qur’anic context of the argument and then unpacks […] The post 07 – The Kalam Cosmological Argument appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

The Qur’an cites the universe as evidence for God’s existence for two reasons: (1) because it is contingent (this was explained in Episodes 2, 3, 4, and 5) and: (2) because it began to exist. In this episode, Shaykh Hamza explains the scientific evidence for the beginning of the universe and concludes with a brief […] The post 06 – The Universe Began to Exist appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

Atheists frequently claim that the only reason why people have historically believed in God was that they feared natural phenomena, and that by giving scientific explanations for those phenomena, scientists have rendered that belief obsolete. In this episode, Shaykh Hamza explains that this is a straw-man argument that misrepresents the facts (a) that belief in […] The post 05 – God and Science appeared first on SeekersGuidance.

A widespread objection to the argument for God’s existence, is that positing God as the solution to the problem of contingency is an arbitrary solution, and that one could just as well replace God with the physical universe or with the Big Bang. In this episode, Shaykh Hamza shows that this is a hasty and fallacious […] The post 04 – Response to a Materialist Objection appeared first on SeekersGuidance.