[i] Originally, the Qur’ān put these questions to the Meccan Polytheists, who believed in God but denied the Hereafter. The implication is that if they believed in God, they also had to believe in the Judgement Day because that is a necessary consequence of a just, wise, omniscient and omnipotent Creator [5, vol. 4, 2014, p. 58]. These questions, however, are so fundamental, natural, and universal that all of us can be their addressees, especially those who deny the existence of God.

[ii] Our creatureliness and that of the universe is so obvious that, owing to it, one of the ‘Four Horsemen of New Atheism’, Richard Dawkins, ‘could not imagine being an atheist at any time before 1859, when Darwin’s Origin of Species was published.’ [6, p. 10] He refers to it with terms like ‘apparent design’ and asserts that, eventually, we had to give up the idea of a purposeful designer as the theory of evolution came along and explained the biological world’s design (We will come to this point later). However, elsewhere he expressed that we could have ‘a serious discussion’ about and ‘make a reasonably respectable case’ for a deistic creator, ‘who devised the laws of physics, god the mathematician, god who put together the cosmos in the first place and then sat back and watched everything happen.’ [7] This shows that there can hardly be any disagreement, if at all, as to the creatureliness or design of the universe and need for its explanation. Religion attributes it to a mindful external creator but atheism assumes the mindless universe to be its own creator – an assertion which not only lacks any evidence but, even worse, is self-contradictory (See [8, pp. 29–46]).

[iii] An example thereof is polytheism: When some misfortune strikes, monotheistic religion teaches us to be patient and invoke God alone. Thus, we see that monotheists do invoke God to start with, but as their trial prolongs, desperation comes in, making them look elsewhere. The same happened to our primitive ancestors: when their prayers were not fulfilled in their adversities, they invoked angels with the anticipation that they would intercede for them with God. Thus, misuse of the concept of angels in monotheistic religion produced polytheism. For this reason, the study of pure polytheistic traditions reveals the concept of one Sky God therein, held together with the worship of idols and depictions of angels, angel-like creatures, or jinns [2].

[iv] However, we also find bloodshed, disease, genetic disorders, pain, distress, natural disasters, and other such apparent evils in the world. The Qur’ān elucidates that such things seem evil because of man’s limited knowledge and perspective (See, for example, 18:60-82 and 2:216). God is all-good, and everything He does or allows to happen has a good purpose behind it. Consider a mother forcibly waking her little girl every day before sunrise and pushing her out of the house in bitter cold. It may seem evil to the little girl; however, when she would realise the importance of school with age, she would eventually acknowledge it as an act of care, wisdom, and dutifulness. Similarly, although we cannot yet make sense of everything that happens, we must not lose our trust, hope, and faith in God. He deserves to be thought about positively because of His countless blessings upon us, myriad good things He has created, and all the good purposes He has revealed (or we have discovered) behind the ups and downs of this world.

[v] Here, we have inferred the existence of God to explain the existence of the universe. Such an inference to the most likely or best explanation of some observation(s) is formally called ‘abductive reasoning’ or ‘abduction’. Abduction is ubiquitous in all fields of study, including science. The Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy states, ‘Philosophers of science have argued that abduction is a cornerstone of scientific methodology; see, for instance, Boyd 1981, 1984, Harré 1986, 1988, Lipton 1991, 2004, and Psillos 1999. According to Timothy Williamson (2007), “[t]he abductive methodology is the best science provides” and Ernan McMullin (1992) even goes so far to call abduction “the inference that makes science.”’ [9] An example of abductive reasoning is the theory of evolution, wherein common descent is inferred as the most likely explanation of available data (showing variation within species; homologous structures among species; and similar or, sometimes, identical genes across species etc). Another example is the discovery of sub-atomic particles, whose existence cannot be directly perceived but inferred from their effects. Yet another interesting example is the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence (SETI), wherein radio signals are monitored from the outer space for semantic messages. The underlying idea here is based on abductive reasoning that if such a message is received or intercepted, it would be indicative of other intelligent beings in the universe. In 1982, a petition from Carl Sagan advocating SETI was published in one of the most prestigious scientific journals, Science [10]. The petition was signed by 68 scientists, with seven Nobel Prize winners among them. Since then, many expensive projects have been undertaken and much collective effort is dedicated to SETI. Recently, a Stephen Hawking-backed programme, ‘Breakthrough Initiatives’, is launched for this purpose with $100 million cash investment [11]. One project of the programme, ‘Breakthrough Listen’, is dedicated to probe over one million stars for radio or laser signals in anticipation of intelligent life.

[vi] Here, too, the Meccan Polytheists are the primary addressees. The aim is to establish the advent of the Judgement Day by reminding them of the extraordinary providence, wisdom, power, and control of God [5, vol. 4, 2014, pp. 442–446].

[vii] A prophet is he who, upon receiving divine revelation, preaches God’s will to his people and proclaims that those who would live by it shall have a good fate in the Hereafter, whereas those who would deviate from it shall have to face its consequences on the Judgement Day. In contrast, a messenger is a prophet who, in addition, warns his people of a miniature judgement awaiting them right in this world [12, pp. 71-72].

[viii] This is a recurrent topic in the Qur’ān; see, for example, 10:47, 24:55, 58:20-21, 61:8-9, and Chapter 54. For a detailed discussion, see [12, pp. 534–552].

[ix] God has erased this vow from our memories and has also kept Himself invisible in the wake of His grand scheme. As per this scheme, this world is created as a temporary place of trial to select individuals for the forthcoming eternal world (Qur’ān 67:2). Only those will be selected therefor who listen to their conscience, let evidence lead them to truth, and adhere to good moral conduct despite having a choice to do the opposite (Qur’ān 4:135, 103, 2:256, and 76:3). But our free will would have been subdued and real attitude towards evidence could never come to the surface if God were perceivable or such vows, made in the presence of God, persisted in our memories. Nonetheless, the Qur’ān insists that this vow will be used against all deniers of God and polytheists on the Judgement Day. That is because, even if God is not visible, the awareness of our creatureliness and that of the universe is deeply ingrained in our nature as a constant reminder of a creator. ‘A creator’ not ‘creators’ because our nature is monotheistic, predisposing our minds to the idea of one Supreme Being (Qur’ān 30:28-31). This predisposition is so strong that even among many gods of polytheistic mythologies, the greatest is always only one. (See [5, vol. 2, 2015, pp. 240–243] and [13].)

[x] For example, for actions like theft, murder, or even a few symbols found on a cave’s wall. One may argue that the human agency or mind is sought here simply because these are empirically known actions of intelligent beings. Let us use the same argument to analyse, for example, DNA of the cell. Each DNA molecule contains complex specified information – a feature not simply analogous but identical to language. Since the only source of any language is intelligence, we are compelled to infer a mind behind DNA [4, pp. 135–192][14].

Note that we are not proposing a ‘god of the gaps’ here, i.e., a god postulated because we cannot explain how DNA or RNA originated, and who would perish as soon as our scientific research will fill this knowledge gap. Firstly, the explanation or, rather, description of mechanisms through which DNA came about is one thing and the explanation of the whole show of life is quite another, i.e., the propensity of matter to transform into chemical elements, DNA, ribosomes, proteins, a functional cell and, then, evolve into higher animals with brains capable of appreciating this whole show. This complete story of life – with information (genetic code) lying at the heart of it as an obvious indicator – requires a metaphysical explanation, irrespective of any scientific descriptions. Secondly, this inference is based not on ignorance (gap), but on knowledge of DNA gained through scientific research. (For details, see [4, pp. 31–46 and 174–192].)

Also, note that the same abductive inference – namely from semantic information to an intelligent source – is central to SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence), backed by Carl Sagan, Stephen Hawking, and other prominent scientists (See footnote 5). Now, suppose if one of the dedicated radio-telescopes receives a book like Hawking’s ‘A Brief History of Time’ (any genome, at least, is as information-rich), should that be dismissed as no evidence for the existence of extra-terrestrial intelligence and labelled ‘alien of the gaps’ [4]? After all, what's good for the goose is good for the gander!

[xi] Some eminent physicists believe that laws existed when there was nothing and brought into existence the universe and all we have herein. This idea is based on misconception of laws. Laws of nature are nothing but descriptions of certain consistent behaviours, outcomes, or phenomena that particulars in the universe are predisposed to produce due to their inherent tendencies, capacities, or causal powers (See [15]). Since these powers are dispositions or properties, there is no question of them (what to speak of laws) without a prior existence of particulars (essentially, i.e., matter, energy and/or space).

[xii] In his book ‘The Blind Watchmaker’, Dawkins argues that the ‘apparent design’ in the biological world can be fully explained by the theory of evolution, rendering any purposeful designer irrelevant or redundant. Again, Lennox can help us get rid of this myth: Firstly, this thesis commits a ‘category mistake’ in that it confuses two different levels of explanation, i.e., God (an agent) and evolution (a mechanism). The mechanism of, say, assemblage of cars in some automated car-plant can be explained solely in scientific terms. However, it does not make the other level of explanation of the plant redundant, namely that it is there because some intelligent minds carefully set it up and are constantly supervising it. Both these complementary explanations are necessary to give a holistic explanation of the plant. ‘It is the same with explanations of the universe,’ writes Lennox. ‘God does not conflict or compete with the laws of physics (or evolution) as an explanation. God is actually the ground of all explanation, in the sense that he is the cause in the first place of there being a world for the laws of physics to describe… Offering people the choice between God and science is therefore illogical.’ ([8, p. 37]; parentheses mine.) Secondly, numerous pre-requisites for evolution – such as the inherent potential of matter or laws of physics – are taken for granted in such narratives which, as we have discussed, clearly indicate the involvement of an intelligent source. There is no alternative explanation for these, except blind chance. Thirdly, it is pseudoscience anyway to claim that ‘natural selection… is the explanation for the existence and apparently purposeful form of all life.’ [6, p. 9] Natural selection does not explain the existence of life; rather, life (a mutating replicator, at least) must first exist for any selection to take place. Also, if the available evidence is not extrapolated, it suggests that mutation and natural selection only explain some of biological world’s observations, by far not all of life’s complexity. (For details, see [4, pp. 44-46, 69-77, and 86-134].)