The Qur’ān (25:2) says: “….It is He who has created everything and then ordained its destiny.” There are other translations of this ayah also: “He has ordained it in due proportion”; or “He has appointed an exact measure for everything.”
However, the real sense of the ayah, is: “Allah has not only created everything in the universe but also determined its shape, size, potentialities, characteristics, term of existence, limitations and the extent of its development and all other things concerning it. Then, He has created the means and provisions to enable it to function properly in its own separate sphere.”
This is one of the most comprehensive ayaat of the Qur’ān with regard to the doctrine of Tauhid. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ himself taught this ayah to every child of his family as soon as it was able to speak and utter a few words. Thus, this ayah is the best means of impressing the Doctrine of Tauhid on our minds, and every Muslim should use it for educating his children as soon as they develop understanding.
The nature of the universe, its makeup and constitution fill us with wonder. It makes nonsense of any suggestion that the universe came into being by chance. It demonstrates the meticulous and detailed proportioning of creation, which human knowledge can hardly manage to fathom even in one area of the vast universe.
With every scientific progress made, more aspects of the harmony and balance in the universe and its natural laws are discovered. Consequently, we can better appreciate the meaning of this wonderful ayah.
It is useful to mention here some scientific facts that emphasise the fine proportions observed in the creation of our world. A.C. Morrison writes in his book, Man Does Not Stand Alone: It is at least extraordinary that in this adjustment of nature there should have been such exquisite nicety. For, had the crust of the earth been ten feet thicker, there would be no oxygen, without which animal life is impossible; and had the ocean been a few feet deeper, carbon dioxide and oxygen would have been absorbed and vegetable life on the surface of the land could not exist… If the atmosphere had been much thinner, some of the meteors which are now burned in the outer atmosphere by the millions every day would strike all parts of the earth. They travel from six to forty miles a second and would set fire to every burnable object. If they travelled as slowly as a bullet, they would all hit the earth and the consequences would be dire.
As for man, the impact of a tiny meteor travelling ninety times as fast as a bullet would tear him in pieces by the heat of its passage. The atmosphere is just thick enough to let in the actinic rays needed for vegetation and to kill bacteria, produce vitamins, and not harm man unless he exposes himself too long. In spite of all the gaseous emanations from the earth of all the ages, most of them poisonous, the atmosphere remains practically uncontaminated and unchanging in its balanced relationship necessary to man’s very existence.
The great balance wheel is that vast mass of water, the sea, from which have come life, food, rain, temperate climate, plants, animals, and ultimately man himself. If, for instance, instead of 21 per cent oxygen were 50 per cent or more of the atmosphere, all combustible substances in the world would become inflammable to such an extent that the first stroke of lightning to hit a tree would ignite the forest, which would almost explode. If it were reduced to 10 per cent or less, life might through the ages have adjusted itself to it, but few of the elements of civilization now so familiar to man, such as fire, would be available. How strange is the system of checks and balances! Man only has upset this balance of nature by moving plants and animals from place to place, and he has immediately paid a severe penalty in the development of animal, insect, and plant pests.
The following fact is a striking illustration that specifically points out to the importance of recognising these checks related to the existence of man. Many years ago, a species of cactus was planted in Australia as a protective fence. The cactus had no insect enemies in Australia and soon began a prodigious growth. The march of the cactus persisted until it had covered an area approximately as great as England, crowded the inhabitants out of towns and villages, and destroyed their farms, making cultivation impossible. No device which the people discovered could stop its spread. Australia was in danger of being overwhelmed by a silent, uncontrollable, advancing army of vegetation.
The entomologists scoured the world and finally found an insect which lived exclusively on cactus, would eat nothing else, would breed freely, and which had no enemies in Australia. Here the animal conquered the vegetation and today the cactus pest has retreated, and with it all but a small protective residue of the insects, enough to hold the cactus in check forever.
The checks and balances have been provided, and have been persistently effective. Why has not the malarial mosquito so dominated the earth that our ancestors through the ages have not either died or become immune? The same may be said of the yellow fever mosquito, which lived one season as far north as New York. Mosquitoes are plentiful in the Arctic. Why has not the tsetse fly evolved so that he would live in other than his tropical surroundings and wipe out the human race? One has but to mention the plagues and the deadly germs against which man has had no protection until yesterday, and his total lack of knowledge of sanitation as an animal, to understand how wonderful has been his preservation.
The insects have no lungs such as man possesses but breathe through tubes. When insects grow large, the tubes cannot grow in relation to the increasing size of the body of the insect. Hence there never has been an insect more than inches long and a little longer wing spread. Because of the mechanism of their structure and their method of breathing, there never could be an insect of great size. This limit in their growth held all insects in check and prevented them from dominating the world. If this physical check had not been provided, man could not exist.
Imagine a primitive man meeting a hornet as big as a lion or a spider equally large. Little has been said regarding the many other marvellous adjustments in the physiology of animals, without which no animal, or indeed vegetable, could continue to exist. (A.C. Morrison)
Thus, day by day, human knowledge uncovers more and more of the elaborate system that gives every creature their measure, proportion and balance. With such increased knowledge we appreciate even better the significance of the Qur’ānic statement: “…. It is He who has created everything and then ordained its destiny.”