Is Man Superior To Angels?
Question: When we say man is the most superior creature (Ashraf al-Makhluqaat) does it mean that from all the things. Created by Allah, man is the best, even greater than the angels?
Answer: Like the other creations. Man and angels are also the creatures of Allah. The only difference is that Man has some extraordinary capabilities, which the angels do not have. In addition to this the angels are created in such a way that they are free from selfish desires. Apart from this the animals do not have reasoning capacity, they only possess animal desires but both these abilities are present in Man.
Because Man has these two opposite qualities his responsibility is also serious and dangerous. Therefore if Man follows the intellect and if he recognizes Allah and becomes faithful and suppresses his wrongful desires he can become better than angels. If he follows his base desires and becomes aloof of the guidance of intellect and also dissociates from truth, goodness and faith he becomes worse than animals.
This is the reason that we read in the Qur’an that when the Almighty Allah created Adam (a.s.). He commanded all the angels to prostrate before him and ordered Adam (a.s.) to tell the angels what he knew and in other words Allah made Adam (a.s.) the teacher of the angels.
Maturity of Boys and Girls
Question: Physiology has almost proved that there is difference between males and females from the aspect of their physical and intellectual capabilities. In spite of this Islam has prescribed the completion of 9 years as maturity for girls and imposed all religious duties on them, while for the boys the age of maturity in completion of 15 years. What is the philosophy behind this law?
Answer: The only fact proved by scientific research is that a woman grows faster than man. Therefore the stage which a man reaches at 15 years is reached by a female in 9 years. And this is not confined to only man and woman. Rather, in animals and plant kingdom also the weakest of them reach their maturity at the earliest. For example the Niloufer grows up faster than the Chinar tree.
The gist of this discussion is that the weaker is the creature the faster is its growth. This is the reason that many girls of 13 or 14 years are capable of motherhood while most of the boys generally haven’t reach puberty yet at this age.
