The Islam Compass

Were You Created for Nothing?

Six things you cannot explain away — and the question they keep asking.

Questions6 min

أَفَحَسِبْتُمْ أَنَّمَا خَلَقْنَـٰكُمْ عَبَثًا وَأَنَّكُمْ إِلَيْنَا لَا تُرْجَعُونَ ۝ فَتَعَـٰلَى ٱللَّهُ ٱلْمَلِكُ ٱلْحَقُّ ۖ لَآ إِلَـٰهَ إِلَّا هُوَ رَبُّ ٱلْعَرْشِ ٱلْكَرِيمِ

Then did you think that We created you uselessly and that to Us you would not be returned? So exalted is Allah, the Sovereign, the Truth; there is no deity except Him, Lord of the Noble Throne.
Qur'an — Surah Al-Mu'minun 23:115-116Translation: Saheeh International

The word translated 'uselessly' is ʿabathan — for sport, for no serious end. The verse is a question, and it is addressed to anyone who lives as if the answer were yes. Below are six features of your own experience. None of them is a proof. Each of them is a question that will not go away.

  • TafsirIbn Kathir, Tafsir al-Qur'an al-'Azim, on 23:115-116ʿabathan: in play, without purpose.
  • 01

    Existence

    There is something rather than nothing, and you are part of it. Whatever else is uncertain, this is not. The Qur'an asks whether this something made itself, came from nothing, or was made.

  • 02

    Consciousness

    You are not only a body that moves; you are someone to whom things happen. You experience colour, grief, music. No one has explained how matter alone produces this — and the Qur'an speaks of a spirit breathed into the human being that is not reducible to clay.

  • 03

    Purpose

    You cannot stop asking what your life is for. Cats do not ask this; you cannot help asking it. The question is either a cruel accident or a clue.

  • 04

    Morality

    You know that some things are wrong even when they are legal, popular or profitable. The Qur'an says this knowledge was placed in you — that the soul was 'inspired' with a sense of its own wickedness and righteousness.

  • 05

    Death

    You will not be here for long. Every project you begin is begun by someone who will not see how it all turns out. The Qur'an does not let this be forgotten.

  • 06

    Accountability

    You feel — even when you argue yourself out of it — that it should matter how a life was lived; that cruelty unpunished and kindness unrewarded is not how things ought to end. The Qur'an says it is not how things end.

And [by] the soul and He who proportioned it And inspired it [with discernment of] its wickedness and its righteousness
Qur'an — Surah Ash-Shams 91:7-8Translation: Saheeh International

What philosophy can and cannot do

Reflection of this kind can open the question of purpose. It cannot, by itself, close it. Human reasoning about the meaning of life has run for thousands of years without arriving at a shared answer, which is itself telling: if the answer is to be had, it will have to come from outside — from the One who did the creating.

That is why the Qur'an, having asked the question, does not leave the reader to speculate. It answers. And it asks to be tested on the answer.

Follow the question

Sources & References

12 cited

Religious content here follows the Qur'an, the authentic Sunnah, and the established scholarship of Ahl al-Sunnah wa al-Jama'ah. Qur'an citations link to the verse; hadith carry collection and number; Tafsir and historical claims name the work. Where something could not be verified, it is not published.

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