Free will

The question of free will/destiny was brought up in this post by 8&20 today. I originally started responding to it as a comment, but had so much to say that I figured it would be easier as a post in and of itself - so here goes. Btw, I encourage you to read the text of the post, as well as the comments, as I refer to it below a couple of times. And pardon me if you find this a repetition of past conversations/posts/comments - I've probably discussed some of these ideas before!

There are three possible hypotheses when it comes to free will. These are:

1. We have complete free will over everything in our lives.
2. We have absolutely no free will, and choice is an illusion.
3. We have some free will.

First lets talk about the idea of a "circle of influence" (which, btw, I like), as brought up by PeeVee in her comment on that post. Clearly if we look at the world around us it should be manifestly clear that certain things are within out control, and certain things not. So anyone who says he has complete free will to do anything is of course wrong - because we are constrained by the laws of this world, as well as by myriad forces (natural, human, animal...) working their way in this world. Likewise, I do have some control over things - I can choose to type "asdasdgdhdfxv" right now instead of an intelligible word. So understanding my "circle of influence" is key to living peacefully in life! :)

So it seems clear that we don't have complete free will. And so I think we can safely reject hypothesis 1. Now the next question is whether we have any free will at all - or whether even when I think i have control, I really don't - as 8&20 asked, is everything written? So how do we choose between hypotheses 2 and 3? And btw, hypothesis 2 is a pretty commonly held view, that choice is but an illusion, and in reality we're just fulfilling some previously laid out plan. This view of course needs to be reconciled with the fact that we seem to have choice - so it is rationalized by stating that though we really have no free will, we should always act like we do.

Now in my understanding - and this is just my opinion - this is not how things are. We really do have free will to make choices. Destiny, I believe, should be understood as true intended purpose - that which something is intended for. To explain this further, I believe that God has created everything with a destiny in mind for it. That destiny is fundamentally for it to grow until it becomes the fullest possible expression of its latent capacities. The destiny of a tree, therefore, is to grow and bear fruit. The destiny of an animal is to grow, bear offspring, and utilize its senses to their fullest capacities. The destiny of man is not just to fulfill the needs of his material existence, but to transcend that and to recognize his essential spiritual nature, and to know God. Every man, however, can choose not to do this. The quote below summarizes all of the above.

"Some things are subject to the free will of man, such as justice, equity, tyranny and injustice, in other words, good and evil actions; it is evident and clear that these actions are, for the most part, left to the will of man. But there are certain things to which man is forced and compelled, such as sleep, death, sickness, decline of power, injuries and misfortunes; these are not subject to the will of man, and he is not responsible for them, for he is compelled to endure them. But in the choice of good and bad actions he is free, and he commits them according to his own will."

-- Abdu'l Baha

So in some sense, it is "written", that ideally we, as humans, should develop our spiritual capacities/virtues. But the choice of doing this is entirely ours.

One subtlety to this notion of free will, I believe, comes about when we consider the dependence of man's actions/will on the independently existing entity that is God. This relationship is beautifully expressed through this analogy - imagine we are in a sailboat in an ocean. As the sailor, I have control over the rudder, and so I can choose which direction to steer by boat in. However, irrespective of what I do with the rudder, unless the wind blows, I can go nowhere. The blowing of the wind (analogous to God's grace) is out of my "circle of influence" (and in fact, out of the circle of influence of every other sailboat on this ocean), and without it, I can achieve nothing. So the choice of good or evil belongs to me, though neither action would be possible without "help" from God. Again, this is summarized in another analogy given below:

"So if a king should appoint someone to be the governor of a city, and should grant him the power of authority, and should show him the paths of justice and injustice according to the laws—if then this governor should commit injustice, although he should act by the authority and power of the king, the latter would be absolved from injustice. But if he should act with justice, he would do it also through the authority of the king, who would be pleased and satisfied."

and

"...the inaction or the movement of man depend upon the assistance of God. If he is not aided, he is not able to do either good or evil. But when the help of existence comes from the Generous Lord, he is able to do both good and evil; but if the help is cut off, he remains absolutely helpless."

-- Abdu'l Baha

All these seem to point at hypotheses 3 being closer to the truth than 2, and hint at a subtle relationship between our free will, and an all-powerful, independently existing being we call God. Another way of thinking about this notion is to consider that just as our physical actions are subject to physical laws, our choices/moral actions are also subject to spiritual laws - only, these aren't as obviously apparent as physical laws are.

Before, we completely accept hypothesis 3, the other question often raised, when reconciling God and free will, is the notion of God as an Omniscient being - so the question is, if we think of God as all-knowing, then does God have knowledge of an action which will be performed by someone? And if yes, what does that mean for our free will?

I believe there are several ways to understand this from our finite perspective (which means we can never understand it completely anyway). Here are three thoughts on this matter:

1. One analogy is to think of a bird flying thousands of feet above the ground so it can see everything below it. Now it sees a car moving along a road, and sees that as it is moving, the road curves to the right and then to the left. Now from the point of view of the person driving the car, he believes he is choosing to turn right, then left, which he is. Does the fact that the bird can see the entire road (which he cannot see) negate the fact that he is making that choice? The bird is removed from the temporal sequence of events that the driver in the car is going through - and so it has a view that is outside of time (in this situation). Take this idea to the limit, and include everything in creation in it - and God is possibly somewhat like the bird that is entirely outside everything, and has a bird's eye view of things.

2. Here's another analogy. My father knows me very well - maybe more than most people. So given a situation, he can predict accurately, more often than not, what I am likely to do in that situation. Does this mean that in the situations where he could say what I would do, I had no choice in the matter? Obviously not. It was only because he understood my nature, that he was able to make that prediction. Now lets take this analogy to the limit, and imagine a being that is intimately and completely familiar with every atom of my being - could that being not then accurately know everything I would choose to do in every situation? And extend this even further to a being that is intimately knowledgeable about the nature of every atom in this universe - would this being then not know what would happen to each and every one of those atoms over time? Again, would this negate my own free will?

3. Finally, another quote to make all of this clear:

"The foreknowledge of a thing is not the cause of its realization; for the essential knowledge of God surrounds, in the same way, the realities of things, before as well as after their existence, and it does not become the cause of their existence. It is a perfection of God... For example, tonight everyone knows that after seven hours the sun will rise, but this general foreknowledge does not cause the rising and appearance of the sun.

Therefore, the knowledge of God in the realm of contingency does not produce the forms of the things. On the contrary, it is purified from the past, present and future. It is identical with the reality of the things; it is not the cause of their occurrence...

The mathematicians by astronomical calculations know that at a certain time an eclipse of the moon or the sun will occur. Surely this discovery does not cause the eclipse to take place. This is, of course, only an analogy and not an exact image."

-- Abdu'l Baha

Hopefully with the above 3 points, we have a (slightly) better understanding of the interaction between our free will, and the concept of God's omniscience.

So to summarize, it appears that by meditating on our existence in this world, we can safely reject hypothesis 1 which claims we have complete free will. Further thought leads us to question the notion of choice being an illusion, and apart from the complete apathy such a situation would lead to, it seems to be to be logically shaky, and completely negating personal experience. And so by the principle of Occam's razor, one would have to reject hypothesis 2 - after all, why should I come up with a convoluted theory of illusion to explain away the free will that every moment of my life clearly testifies I have? The only reason to do so is if I cannot somehow reconcile free will with the concept of God.

Finally coming to hypothesis 3, this to me seems to be closest to the truth - and the discussion above points towards some of the characteristics of this state of being, things over which we have free will and things over which we don't, and the interactions between finite beings with some free will and an infinite being that is the source of all things.

Disclaimer: Though I freely use the word "being" for God, and though some of my statements might seem to anthropomorphize God, I should make clear that this is purely a result of the inability of understanding God through our finite minds and imperfect language.

"To every discerning and illumined heart it is evident that God, the unknowable Essence, the Divine Being, is immeasurably exalted beyond every human attribute such as corporeal existence, ascent and descent, egress and regress… He is, and hath ever been, veiled in the ancient eternity of His Essence, and will remain in His Reality everlastingly hidden from the sight of men…"

-- Baha'u'llah