If none of Allah's attributes/actions point to His essence, what, if anything, describes Who He is? God's absolute will, one that wills everything in the universe, seems to be the unifying principle of this unknowable god. Both good and evil are directly willed by Allah. Surah 32:13 states that Allah could have willed salvation, but chose damnation for many. He wills belief and unbelief and creates the sin of the latter. The creeds of Islam portray the will of Allah as absolute--nothing in the universe can will contrary to his will. The Biblical description of Yahweh and Jesus Christ requires a distinction between God's perfect will and His permissive will. "God is not willing that any should perish but that all come into repentance" (2 Peter 3:9) communicates God's PERFECT will. While He only wills the good, He nevertheless PERMITS men and angels to will contrary to His own. Yahweh's will is not absolute in the above sense, for it allows choices contrary to His will. This permissive will underscores the essential goodness of the Christian God, One who would draw His creatures to freely choose Him out of genuine love for Him. He is not so insecure that He is threatened by any being in the universe that wills contrary to His will. The self-limiting permissive will of God, grounded in His loving essence (1 John 4:8) "risks" the rebellion of other wills, while He woos them with His essential goodness. Allah and Jesus Christ couldn't be more different. The episode also addresses common questions regarding God's sovereignty and God's "hardening of Pharaoh's heart."
The Unknowable God of Islam
This episode unpacks the implications of Islamic agnosticism. Since Allah is wholly other, and even descriptions of His attributes in the Quran don't point to His essence (notwithstanding Sunni repackaging of Tahwid), Muslims are called to worship an unknowable god. Consequently the Quran is a guide for Muslims containing descriptions of what God does divorced from what He is. The 99 names of Allah, for instance, reveals sometimes contradictory attributes of God based on what He does, but this is not a problem since Allah's "wholly other" essence is not informed by His attributes. The episode also cites the Sufi mystical alternative, which seeks to get around the agnostic problem in Islam.
Islam on a Collision Course with Itself: the Quran
The God of Islam is so radically transcendent that nothing in the created order points to His essence. In the words of Surah 112, "there is none like unto Him," and this core doctrine of Tahwid insists on one eternal indivisible God who has no partners. This fundamental doctrine of Islam nevertheless contradicts the orthodox belief of Sunni Muslims, that the Quran itself is also eternal. If the speech of God in the Quran is also eternal and not created, then Tahwid is compromised and contradicted, the singular eternal indivisible God has a partner (shirk), His own eternal speech recorded in the Quran. Tawhid impales itself on an eternal Quran based on Allah's inflexible "oneness." Ironically, the answer to this intractable problem in Islam is the Christian God: God the Father and God the Son are both eternal. The Son is the eternal Word of God, the Logos who is one in essence with God the Father, yet a distinct person in the godhead. Orthodox Sunni Islam is self-contradictory: 1) The Quran is eternal, 2) Tahwid is true, and 3) Allah's attributes in the Quran describe His essence, contradicting Tahwid.
An Opening Primer on Allah
This and the next 10 episodes contrast the god of Islam with that of Christianity. The program begins with an excerpt from the popular biography of Mohammed by Ibn Ishaq, describing his initial encounter with the angel Gabriel. Mohammed purportedly received divine revelation that was later written in the Quran. Divided into 114 surahs, or chapters, the Quran presents a description of Allah (god) that differs significantly from the Christian God. Surah 112 captures the differences, affirming that Allah "begetteth not" and there is "none like unto him." The former description posits that no distinct persons exist in the "godhead," and even the word "godhead" is inappropriate. Christianity of course affirms the Trinity, and that Christ is a distinct person in the godhead. The second description, that there is "none like unto him" contends that Allah is so radically transcendent that nothing in the created order describes his essence. Christianity also affirms a transcendent God, but nevertheless insists that creation points to His essence, Romans 1:20 noting "for since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made.."