Divine Knowledge Precedes Creation
Editorial verification status: This atom has been extracted from an explanatory audiovisual source, and it has now been linked to the closest books within the Shahrur project at the book level. For precise academic citation, consult the original book and the original episode together.
Formulation of the claim
Shahrur holds that all beings were first present in God’s knowledge before they appeared in the world. In other words, divine knowledge precedes material existence.
Explanation
Here he relies on the idea of divine comprehensiveness: God “has encompassed everything in number.” The world did not arise from ignorance and then discovery, but from prior, all-encompassing knowledge. It follows that actualization in the world is the transformation of what was known in pre-eternity into a perceptible existent. This idea makes creation a cognitive act as much as it is a constitutive act.
Its place in the episode’s argument
This idea serves the construction of a Qur’anic theory of knowledge that traces the origin of beings back to divine knowledge.
Limits of the claim
It does not deny natural causality within the world after creation.
Brief witness
“The universe was in God’s knowledge as a signifier without signifieds.”
Nearby links
- Shahrur - The Qur’an
- Shahrur - The Book and the Qur’an
- Shahrur - The Mother of the Book and Its Elaboration