Episode 3 – Fitrah and the Computer

Peace and God’s mercy be upon you, dear friends. Today we will begin with the foundation of all foundations: establishing the existence of God, exalted is He, so that we may lay the basis from which to continue.

First, my brothers, what points us to the existence of God? The fitrah and reason. We will begin by discussing the proofs based on the fitrah.

What Is the Fitrah?

We often hear this word. What does it mean, and how does it point to the existence of God, Most High?

The fitrah consists of capacities and impulses placed within the human soul, whose effects appear as a person grows and interacts with the surrounding world: first when an infant takes its mother’s breast to feed, and later when a person is drawn toward truth and sound moral values.

We may compare the human fitrah to a computer’s operating system. The components of this operating system cooperate and harmonize with one another to produce a balanced human being.

Consider these words of God, Most High: “We have certainly created man in the best of stature.” [At-Tin 95:4]. This perfect constitution therefore includes the innate components needed to fulfill the purpose for which the human being was created. This is also understood from the words of God, Most High, reporting the statement of Moses, peace be upon him: “Our Lord is He who gave each thing its form and then guided [it].” [Ta-Ha 20:50].

Among those He guided is the human being: God, Most High, gave him a perfect constitution and guided him through the fitrah.

The Directions of the Fitrah

Through the fitrah, He guided the human being toward:

1. Recognizing that both he and this universe have a Creator who governs them, sensing his need for that Creator, and turning to Him in hardship.
2. He also guided him through the fitrah that gives rise to self-evident principles of reason, through which he understands the Creator’s address and the obligations He places upon him.
3. He guided him to ask about the purpose of his existence and his fate after death. This becomes the driving force that leads him to seek what his Creator wants and comply with it.
4. He also guided him toward moral inclination: an innate love of goodness, justice, and uprightness, and an aversion to evil, injustice, and corruption. This accords with the Creator’s commands, toward which the human being inclines and which he loves.
5. He guided him toward the awareness that he possesses free will, enabling him to choose actions of obedience or disobedience to the Creator: “And have shown him the two ways.” [Al-Balad 90:10].
6. He guided him toward the instincts needed for a balanced life throughout his period of testing on this earth, such as the maternal instinct and the instinct for survival.

You will find an expanded definition of the fitrah, close to this one, in Ibn Ashur’s discussion in At-Tahrir wa at-Tanwir of the words of God, Most High: “We have certainly created man in the best of stature.” [At-Tin 95:4]. The fitrah is thus a set of innate dispositions that cooperate in a remarkable way to produce a balanced human being who acts toward a purpose.

What Veils the Fitrah

Obstacles may veil the fitrah during the course of a person’s life. A person may struggle against it, stop his ears so he does not hear its call, or even repress and erase it until he can no longer hear that deep inner call.

None of this, however, cancels the fact that it was originally present within him before that struggle. It continues to press upon him from time to time and is drawn toward everything that reveals it and clears away the debris accumulated over it.

The Atheists’ Dilemma Before the Fitrah

The fitrah therefore places atheists before a major dilemma. For them, it represents the external intervention of a power possessing will and knowledge, transcending random biochemical interactions.

The atheists’ dilemma resembles that of a person who tells you: this computer formed entirely by chance; its parts assembled and coordinated without a manufacturer; only violent gusts of wind formed it this way.

We open the computer and find a complete, coherent operating system together with programs, each serving a purpose. How do you explain these programs, atheist? Even if we swallowed your laughable claim about the hardware, how would you explain the software content found on the device?

Mere biochemical interactions, random mutations, and natural selection—even if we overlooked the fact that they cannot create a human being, conceded the point, and said that they created a human and breathed life into him—where would all these blind notions obtain the ability to place this coherent, purpose-oriented system into the human mind and soul? And how do you explain the formation of this same system within every new soul that comes into the world?

Some atheists have acknowledged this dilemma, including the British atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel in his well-known book, Mind and Cosmos: Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature Is Almost Certainly False.

The book examines three fundamental questions and demonstrates the inability of Darwinian materialism to solve them: consciousness, cognition, and values. Despite this, the author remained an atheist.

How Atheists Confront the Fitrah Dilemma

How, then, have most atheists confronted this dilemma? They have wavered between denying the innate nature of these components—some deny that they are present from birth and regard them as effects of upbringing and the social environment—and admitting their existence while attempting to find materialist explanations for them.

Both camps have fallen into astonishing errors, contradictions, and absurdities, as we will see, God willing.

Conclusion and What Comes Next

This is what needed to be explained concerning the definition of the fitrah and the general problem it poses for atheists. In the coming episodes, we will examine their unfortunate dead ends regarding each component of the fitrah we have mentioned. You will then be able to declare wholeheartedly: “Praise to Allah, who has guided us to this; and we would never have been guided if Allah had not guided us.” [Al-Araf 7:43].

It should be noted that, in these episodes on the innate proofs for the existence of God, Most High, I benefited greatly from the book Shumu‘ an-Nahar by the engineer Abdullah Al-Ajiri, may God preserve him.

Our next episode, God willing, will discuss religious inclination. Stay with us. Peace and God’s mercy be upon you.