The submission of creation (willing and unwilling)

Sha'rawi reads the verse that everything in the heavens and the earth has submitted to God, willingly or unwillingly, and to him they return (Al Imran 83). He takes submission here to mean subjection and subjugation, holds that all of creation carries out its task in serving the human, and that the human alone bears the duty of choice ¹².

Sha'rawi says each class of creatures serves what is above it: the mineral serves the plant, the plant serves the animal, and animal and plant serve the human. He gives the example of the horse, which is ridden and also carries manure to the field, and says these classes perform their task without rebellion, because God subjected them and told them to serve the human, believer or disbeliever ²⁶.

Sha'rawi says that willing submission, for beings not under obligation, is the obedience of subjection. Unwilling submission falls on what a person has no choice over, such as birth, death and sickness, so a person submits unwillingly in those parts of life. He holds that the chosen submission of the believer is to match God's law in doing and refraining, and so to be in harmony with creation ³⁴⁵.

Sha'rawi rejects reading unwilling submission as forcing people into service or into religion. He says the view, reported from some scholars, that it refers to slaves forced to serve does not hold, since the clear verse denies compulsion in religion ⁴. He says the sword was raised, in his account, to protect freedom of choice, and that the lands Islam came to keep their other religions ⁷.

This is Sha'rawi's reading alone, taken from a scanned copy whose edition is not yet verified, and it is presented under his name. This is a point on which readings differ, and only Sha'rawi's reading is set out here; any other view needs a named source (needs_source). See also Fisq, Compulsion in religion and Environmental protection in Islam.