The law of conservation of energy states that energy cannot be created or destroyed but can only be transformed within a system. However, would this not undermine the teaching that Allāh (God) created the world? Indeed, this question can be posed against any religion that affirms a creator God. The response is that this law applies specifically to closed systems, meaning systems that do not exchange energy or matter with anything outside themselves. Scientists often model the universe as a closed system. However, from a theistic perspective, the universe is not ultimately a closed system because it had a beginning and depends on a cause beyond itself. Since Allāh exists beyond the universe, Allāh’s creative act is understood to occur outside the physical universe and its laws, including conservation of energy. Therefore, Allāh is not subject to the laws that govern the universe; in fact, he is the Creator of such laws.

The analogy of a video game can help one understand how Allāh is not subject to the universe’s laws. Just as a video game operates according to fixed rules, its characters are bound by those rules and cannot act outside of them. However, the designer who created the game is not limited by these constraints, as the designer exists outside the system and can modify or override its rules at will. Similarly, Allāh is the transcendent Creator of the universe who established the laws of nature but is not subject to them. The point of the analogy is not to demonstrate that the world is a video game but to highlight the similarity between the world and a video game. This analogy helps illustrate how a being outside the system could logically exist without being governed by the same physical laws that apply within the system.

It is also important to note that this is not a case of special pleading. We do not claim that Allāh is an exception to this law without providing a valid reason for saying so; instead, the existence of Allāh is established due to the contingency of the universe. From there, it can be derived that a necessary being beyond the universe must exist. Such a being transcends the universe, which is why it is not subject to its physical laws.