التَّأوِيلُ الإِسمَاعِيلِيُّ لِلقَضَاءِ وَالقَدَر — القَضَاءُ وَالقَدَر: كَيفَ تُوَسِّطُ هِرَارِكِيَّةُ الحُدُودِ الكَونِيَّةُ القَضَاءَ الإِلَهِيَّ إِلَى كُلِّ نَفسٍ وَلِمَاذَا يَكُونُ الإِمَامُ مَوضِعَ القَضَاءِ الإِلَهِيِّ الأَرضِيَّ وَالحَلُّ الإِسمَاعِيلِيُّ لِمَسأَلَةِ الجَبرِ وَالاختِيَار
In Ismaili ta'wil, al-Qada' wal-Qadar (القَضَاءُ وَالقَدَر — Divine Decree and Measure; *qada'* from *q-d-w/q-d-y*: to judge, decide, decree; *qadar* from *q-d-r*: to measure, to determine the extent/portion; the sixth pillar of Islamic faith [alongside belief in God, angels, revealed books, prophets, and the Last Day]; the zahir: God decrees all events before they happen; everything in existence is within God's prior knowledge and will; nothing occurs except by God's permission [idhn]; the Ashari position: God's decree encompasses all human actions including choices — the human illusion of choice is real at the phenomenal level but God's pre-decree is ontologically prior; the Mutazili position: God grants humans genuine causal freedom over their choices — to judge them otherwise would make God unjust in rewarding/punishing; the Ismaili ta'wil: qada' and qadar are reframed through the cosmic hierarchy [hudud al-din]; the divine command [amr] descends through the hierarchy: from God → Universal Intellect → Universal Soul → Imam; the Imam is the earthly locus of divine qada' in each age — the Imam's ta'wil of the Quran and guidance of the community IS the divine decree reaching the world in that age; the believer's qadar [measured destiny] is their particular relationship with the Imam's guidance; the resolution of the free will problem: the believer's choice to enter walayah with the Imam is simultaneously: [1] a free act of the soul — genuine, unmeasured, unconstrained by God; [2] divinely decreed — because God's decree is that those who choose rightly will be guided, and the Imam is that guidance; the paradox resolves by understanding that God's decree is the 'that' [that guidance exists], while the human act is the 'whether' [whether the soul accepts it]) is the Ismaili theodicy of destiny and guidance.
The Cosmic Chain of Decree
The divine decree does not reach individual souls directly and unmediated. In Ismaili cosmology, the divine command (amr) descends through the hudud (cosmic hierarchy):
God → Universal Intellect (Aql al-Kulli) → Universal Soul (Nafs al-Kulliyya) → Imam → Believer
The Imam is not merely a human teacher — he is the earthly representative of divine qada’ in his age. When the Imam teaches the ta’wil of the Quran, that teaching is not human interpretation but divine decree reaching the community through its proper channel.
This transforms the question of qada’ and qadar: divine decree is not a set of specific future events inscribed before creation (as in some classical Ashari readings) but a dynamic structure of guidance that descends through the hierarchy to each soul in its particular situation.
The Free Will Resolution
The classic dilemma: if God decreed all my choices before I made them, how am I responsible for them? If I am responsible, how is God all-determining?
The Ismaili ta’wil offers a structural resolution:
- God’s qada’ is that the Imam exists in every age as the locus of divine guidance
- The human qadar is the particular measure of each soul’s relationship to that guidance
- The free act is whether the soul accepts or refuses walayah with the Imam
God does not decree the specific act of any individual soul’s acceptance or refusal. God decrees that guidance exists (through the Imam) and that those who accept it will be guided. The soul’s act of acceptance is genuinely free — unmeasured by God, which is precisely why it is the soul’s act and why the soul is accountable.
See also: Ismaili Cosmology Hudud Al Din, Bayah And Walayah, Ismaili Tawil Of Al Maad, Ismaili Tawil Of Al Iman, Tawil Esoteric Interpretation