Part 01 Fate vs Free-Will

Who's pulling the strings?

I Am The Master Of My Fate

Part1 What's destiny? A Muslim's Perspective

Shall We Make Efforts?

People argue that why despite the efforts they don't get the desired outcomes and if the outcomes are already predestined than why are we making efforts?

Jabir ibn Abdullah (RA) reported that the Prophet ﷺ said:

“No soul will die until it has received all its provisions and completed its lifespan. So, fear Allah and seek your provision in a lawful way. Do not let delays in sustenance lead you to seek it through unlawful means.”

Sunan Ibn Majah (2144) - Hasan (Good) Hadith

Quran backs the hadith as in Chapter 54 verse 49, Allah says:

"Indeed, We have created everything according to a measure (Qadar)."

We already know that no one can have more than what's destined and before the destined time. What you're going to eat has been decided the time it was being written on loh e mehfoz.

Abdullah ibn Amr (RA) reported:
I heard the Messenger of Allah ﷺ say:

“Allah wrote the decrees of creation fifty thousand years before He created the heavens and the earth.”
Sahih Muslim (2653)

Imagine---You're cooking a meal for the 100th time—a dish you've perfected over the years. With utmost precision and care, you prepare the ingredients, ensuring every step is flawlessly executed. The oven is preheated, set at the perfect temperature, and ready to bake your smoky BBQ lasagna. Confident in your calculations and diligence, you place it in the oven and wait.

But when the timer goes off and you open the oven—you’re shocked! The lasagna remains in its uncooked state. You check the oven—it appears perfectly functional, the display shows the temperature, and it even feels hot. Yet, the lasagna isn’t baking.

Now, despite your efforts being flawless, something beyond your control prevented the outcome you expected. Was it your fault? The planets? Your mischievous sibling? Or God?

Maybe someone tampered with the oven, but it wasn’t you, and of course, God cannot be blamed, for He is perfect in wisdom. The answer is simple: The outcome—whether the lasagna bakes or not—was never entirely in your control. You put in the effort, but the result was determined by something beyond you. And for that, you are not to blame.

Now, consider the reverse case: What if you had completely forgotten to make the lasagna, and your hungry family sat there, red-faced, waiting? This time, you would be at fault, regardless of whether the oven was working or not.

Effort is in your hands; the outcome is in Allah’s hand

What's an Effort?

You may ask, then who's intervention it was? What's the logic behind such a small task not being perfectly executed? Well, to answer it I shall first clear a thing.

The Prophet ﷺ said:

“Nothing repels the Divine Decree except supplication (du’a), and nothing increases lifespan except righteousness.”
Jami` at-Tirmidhi (2139) - Hasan (Good)

How many times do we pray before and after we do a chore? For an example when we do good deed, there's a dua we can recite which shows that we humbly submits the deed to Allah and we don't possess capability of any good if Allah don't make it easy for us.

رَبَّنَا تَقَبَّلْ مِنَّا ۖ إِنَّكَ أَنتَ السَّمِيعُ الْعَلِيمُ
"Our Lord, accept [this] from us. Indeed, You are the All-Hearing, the All-Knowing."
Surah Al-Baqarah (2:127)

We often don't consider reciting dua and thus we lack doing the chores with proper efforts. Efforts = Physical/ Mental Activity + Prayer.

Q: Atheists and non-believers succeed too, even though they don’t pray. How is that fair?

A:
Success in this world doesn’t always reflect the unseen balance of the Hereafter.

Prayer isn’t just a ritual — it’s a reflection of intention, connection, and submission. When we pray, we’re not only asking — we’re aligning ourselves with Divine timing and protection.

Yes, those who don’t pray can still achieve worldly success. But that success often comes at the cost of using up their good deeds here. As the Qur’an implies, they’re rewarded fully in this world for whatever good they’ve done — but they risk losing any share in the Hereafter.

Meanwhile, a believer’s prayer becomes a safeguard. It may delay some rewards in this life, but it preserves the best of them for the next — where the scale truly matters.

So, the question isn’t just: “Did they succeed?”
It’s: “At what cost?”

Now coming back to the topic, who's at fault? No one!

Yes no one, because we are judged on our actions and intentions, not on the basis of outcome. For this dunya, whatsoever goes wrong despite of repeated and correct efforts remember that its still written and recorded in best by Allah. Our people however, judge us on the results we produce and not on the efforts we make. That's why success in this world is not efforts but outcomes. For example, you worked at a company for 30 years but no one knows you except for handing to you more work, this as per our world's standard "not a success but donkey work". But the same efforts and consistency you showed and hard work with which you were able to feed your family has been written "a success" by Allah. Similarly, an influencer with zero hard work reached a fame by just showing a famous dance step or singing some lines of currently famous song. This fame which they had isnt "a success" in eyes of Allah but in our world's sense its "A success". Now do you understand the difference?

To be Continued…