Allah’s Messenger (ﷺ) said: “Indeed the first thing which Allah created was the pen and He told it to write.” When this hadeeth is very clear, is it possible that the scholars like Ibn Taymiyyah, Ibn al-Qayyim, Ibn Katheer and Ibn Abil-‘Izz made a mistake by considering the throne to be the first created thing?
Praise be to Allah.
These ahaadeeth are in harmony with one another; they do not contradict one another. The first thing that Allah created of the things that are known to us was His Throne, which He rose over after He created the heavens, as Allah says (interpretation of the meaning):
“And He it is Who has created the heavens and the earth in six Days and His Throne was on the water, that He might try you, which of you is the best in deeds.” [1]
With regard to the Pen, there is nothing in the hadeeth to indicate that the Pen was the first thing created. What the hadeeth means is that when Allah created the Pen, He commanded it to write, so it wrote down the decrees of all things.[2]
Source:
References:
[1] [Qur'an 11:7]
[2] [Majmoo’ Fataawa wa Rasaa’il Fadeelat al-Shaykh Muhammad ibn Saalih al-‘Uthaymeen, vol. 1, p. 62-63]
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