The Islamic Personality by Sheikh Taqīuddīn An-Nabahānī

Hudā [guidance] linguistically means integrity of conduct [rashad] and showing the way [dalālah]. It is said, ‘he guided him to the deen’, meaning he led him to guidance; ‘I showed him the way and the home’ [meaning to inform him]. Abberance [Dhalāl] is the opposite of consciousness [rashad]. Hidāyah, in its shar’i meaning, is to be guided to Islam and to have imān in it; dhalāl, in its shar’i meaning, is the deviation from Islam, as in the saying of the Prophet PBUH,

Allah has made the Jannah for those who have the hidāyah and the Nār (fire) for those who are on error [dhalāl], that is, Allah  will reward the one who attained the hidāyah and punish the one who is on error [dhalāl]. The connecting of reward or punishment to hudā and dhalāl indicates that hudā and dhalāl are from the actions of man and are not from Allah . If they were from Allah  He  would not rewarded people for having hidāyah and punish them for being on the dalāl, because this would be oppression on the part of Allah , since when he  punishes someone whom He  has caused to go astray, He has done injustice to him. Allah is Exalted High above such. He  says,

And

However, there are ayāt which indicate that hidāyah and dhalāl should be imputed to Allah . So it is understood from them that hidāyah and dhalāl do not emanate from the servant but are from Allah . There are other verses which indicate that hidāyah, dhalāl and idhlāl [causing someone to go astray] are to be ascribed to the servant. From them it is understood that hidāyah and dalāl are from the servant. These, and other verses, should be understood from a legistlative understanding, meaning, that their legislative reality, for which they were legislated, should be understood. It is apparent, then, that the attribution of guidance and misguidance to Allah  has a meaning other than the meaning of attributing guidance and misguidance to the servant. Each one is focused on an angle different from the angle on which the other is focused. In this manner the legislative meaning becomes most evident.

Indeed, the verses which attribute misguidance and guidance to Allah  are explicit in that it is Allah  who guides and it is He  Who causes someone to go astray. He  says,

And,

And He  says,

And,

And,

And He  says,

And,

And,

And,

And He  says,

Thus, in these verses there is a clear indication that the one who does the guiding and misguiding is Allah  and not the servant. This means the servant does not find guidance by himself, rather when Allah  guides him he is guided. And when Allah  sends him astray he goes astray. However, this wording has come with indications [qarā'in] which divert the meaning from one of considering the initiation of guidance and misguidance as being from Allah , to another meaning, namely, that of the creation of guidance and misguidance as being from Allah  and that the one who initiates the guidance, misguidance and the sending of someone astray is the servant. As for these indications they are shar’i and rational indications. As for the shar’i indications, many ayāt have come attributing guidance, misguidance and the causing of misguidance to the servant. He  says,

And,

And,

And He  says,

And,

And,

And He  says,

And,

And,

And He  says,

And,

And,

And He  says,

And,

And,

So in the wording of these verses there is a clear indication that the human being is the one who performs the act of guidance and misguidance, thus he sends himself astray and he sends others astray and the Shaytān also sends people astray. So guidance and misguidance has come to be attributed to man and Shaytān and that man guides himself and sends himself astray. This is an indication [qarinah] that the attribution of guidance and misguidance to Allah  is not one of intiation [mubāsharah] but rather it is one of creation [khalq]. If you place the ayāt together and understand them in a legislative manner, then the departure of each verse from the direction of the other becomes clear. Thus the ayah says,

And the other ayah says,

The first ayah indicates that Allah  is the one who guides and the second indicates that man is the one who guides himself. The guidance of Allah  in the first verse is about creating the guidance in the human being, that is, creating the capacity for guidance. The second ayah indicates that the human beeing is the one who intiates what Allah has created in terms of the capacity for guidance and so he guides himself. That is why He  says in the another ayah,

That is, the path of good and the path of evil, that is, we have given him the capacity for guidance and we have left him to intiate his own guidance. So these ayāt which attribute hidāyah and dhalāl to man are a shar’i indication indicating upon the diverting of the intitiation of guidance from Allah  to the servant. As for the rational indication, Allah  takes people to account: he rewards the one who is guided and punishes the misguided, and He has set the reckoning according to the actions of human beings. He  says,

And,

And,

And He  says,

And,

For if the meaning of ascribing guidance and misguidance to Allah  is that He  initiates it, then His punishing the kāfir, munāfiq and disobedient would constitute injustice; Exalted is Allah far above such. Thus it is necessary to divert its meaning to something other than initiation, namely, (to) the creation of guidance from nothing. Harmony with this is maintained if the one who initiates guidance and misguidance is the servant, and therefore he is accounted for it.

This is with respect to the ayāt in which guidance and misguidance is ascribed to Allah . As regards verses in which guidance and misguidance is linked to His Will,

The meaning of his will here is intention [irādah]. The meaning of these verses is that no one guides himself by force against Allah's Will and nor does anyone forcibly go astray against His Will. Rather the one who finds guidance is the one who finds guidance by the Volition and Will of Allah and the one who goes astray goes astray by the Volition and Will of Allah.

Remaining is the question of the ayāt from which it is understood that there are people who will never be guided, such as His saying,

And,

And His  saying,

These verses are a notification [ikhbār] from Allah  to His Prophets about specific people that they will not believe, so this comes under the Knowledge of Allah . The notification does not mean there is a group which will believe and a group which will not believe. Rather, every human being has the capacity to aquire imān . The Messenger and the da’wah carriers after him address all the people with the call to imān. It is not allowed for the Muslim to despair about anyone’s (having) imān. As for what has come before in the Knowledge of Allah  that he will not believe, Allah  knows this because His  Knowledge encompasses everything; what Allah  has not informed us about what He  knows, it is not allowed for us to pass judgement. The Prophets did not pass jusgement that someone will not believe except after Allah  had informed them of this.

As for His  saying,

And His  saying,

And,

And,

These verses mean that Allah  does not grant them guidance since the granting of guidance comes from Allah . The fāsiq, dhālim, kāfir, dāl, musrif and kadhāb, all of them are characterised by attributes which are not consistent with guidance and Allah  will not grant guidance to the one who has such an attribute, because the granting of guidance is on the basis of the human being attaining its means. The one who is characterised with these attributes does not have these means [asbab], rather they have the means [asbāb] of misguidance; pointing to this, is the saying of Allah ,

And His  saying,

That is, give us tawfīq so that we may be guided, that is, facilitate for us the means [asbāb] of this guidance.