Al-Anbya 16: We have not created the heaven, the earth and the things between them for enjoyment.

Verse 16 of Surah Al-Anbiya. We did not create the heaven, the earth and what is between them as players, for amusement, it says, and it puts it beautifully. Yes. That is, Allah Almighty says: I, as the Creator, did not create you in this world in order to (?), He says; nor did I create you for amusement, nor as a pawn, using you, He says. That's the meaning; look what it says: We did not create the heaven, the earth and what is between them as players; you know how people make games on computers, players: together with them, as a pawn for amusing oneself, you, as a game program I did not take you, He says.

We did not create it as amusement. What? You created. My Lord, why did You create us? Our Lord was an unknown treasure. He gave us a part of His essence. He gave a part of His spirit. He made us the addressees of His Self. And He willed that His Self be known through man. Through man. Yes. Therefore, leaving man free in his own will, with that man knowing His Self through the part of His spirit He gave him, Allah Almighty makes man both the vicegerent of the earth and the addressee of His Self. Through that, Allah Almighty becomes known by people. People, too, know their Creator. Therefore Allah, the greatest of the worlds, the Creator of the worlds, Al-Kabir, that is, the greatest, besides whom there is no one great, none possessing knowledge, no creator: our Lord, holding us as addressees of His Self, speaking with us, you see, and giving us life, and through our duty of servanthood to Him, that is, the duty of knowing Him as great, by creating the worlds, makes His Self known to people in this way.

Makes it known to the worlds. Yes. (?) in this case, that is, when Allah Almighty created these worlds, He did not create them as a toy. Nor did He create them to amuse Himself. After all, people play games and amuse themselves, for example. And what does He do as Creator? He creates the heavens, the earth and what is between them. Come on, let Him play with us like pawns. Never. (?) We did not create. Then why did He create? We will know His Self. We will know that He is the great one of the worlds, and with our own will we will know that there is someone who created these worlds and that we are the servants of the One who created these worlds.

And knowing Him as great, we will be in worship of Him, or else we will keep away from failing Him. In this case, we were created flawed. And because of this flawed creation of ours, knowing our helplessness, from that Great One of ours we will seek repentance and forgiveness. From our Lord. Our Lord, for these sins we have, knowingly or unknowingly, committed, do not call us to account. We ask You for pardon and forgiveness. We will strive not to do this again, we will say. And what do we do? Here we bring our helplessness to light. This also fits our Lord's purpose in creating us. That is, that He did not create a being equal to His Self, even though He created us as addressees of His Self, even though He endowed us with the attributes of the Self, even though of His attributes He gave us a part, even though He gave a part of His spirit, we will say.

But He did not create a being equal to His Self. Yes.

We did not create the heaven, the earth and what is between them as players, as amusement, it says. Now the verse is understood, I suppose.

Allah Almighty did not create the heavens and the earth He created as a game and amusement. Allah, who subsists by His Self, who exists, so that His Self may be known and so that His creatures, by obedience and worship of His Self, may define His existence, may recognize it, created these worlds.

Of the beings He created, everything from the atom to the globe remembers Allah. The earth and the heavens and what is between them have known their Lord's remembrance, according to the verse. Even if man denies his Lord, his being and the atoms in matter and the positive and (?) protons in their nuclei remember Allah. This proves that there is no god other than Allah. So it is through man, into whose hand He gave partial will, that Allah willed His Self to be known. Therefore He did not create these worlds and us as a game and amusement.

Yes, many feelings exist. Those feelings hardly find their way into words. But with an example we can put it like this, as I said earlier: on a computer we play it as two teams, we make pawns in human shape, we have the two teams play a match or wage war. And we sit down in front of it and, just as we programmed them, we watch them. We did not create the worlds like this, it says. We gave you a soul, We gave you life, it says. Gave a soul, gave life. And We made you addressees of Our Self.

Before your eyes We made thousands, hundreds of miracles appear. But you did not use your minds and see those miracles. You drew a veil over your eyes, it says. (?) Yes.

The greatness of Allah Almighty is there: man, helpless like us, and to whom He gave a part of His spirit, He makes the addressee of His Self and speaks with him. He does not act big toward us. But we will know Him as great. Even though He doesn't call Himself great to us, if we fail to know Him as great, we'll get a great slap. We commit great shamelessness. We commit great rudeness. Yes. May Allah protect us.