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Wow. Heat.
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It's Abdahim Green and you're joining me
for the proof that Islam is the truth.
And today we're going to be dealing with
a really truly fascinating subject, the
witnessing of the people of the book.
Now, I'm going to be reading a couple of
long stories over these episodes. So,
um, I hope I make it interesting for
you. And I'm going to be interjecting it
also with some references from the Bible
and the Quran to show how the people of
the book, the Jews and Christians from
amongst their scholars and leaders and
kings recognize that Muhammad, may
Allah's peace and blessings be upon him,
was what he claimed to be, the final
messenger from Allah. Now, I'm going to
start with a famous story that has been
collected by Imam Bkari and his Sah. And
we talked in one of the very earliest
episodes about the authentic nature of
the verified hadith of the prophet
Muhammad. May Allah's blessings be upon
him. And this hadith or this saying is
taken from one of the most authentic
collections after of teachings in Islam
after the Quran which is in Sah Bkari.
Um, and it's telling about how when the
prophet Muhammad at a certain time in
his messengership in the Medina sent
letters to various rulers and
dignitaries throughout the world at the
time, including the Persian Roman
Emperor, for example, the Pope in Rome,
Nagus of Abbiscinia, Makulkus, the
leader of the Cops in Egypt. And one of
these letters reached Heraculus.
Heraculus was the Roman emperor at the
time. And when
Heraculus received this letter, he
called for his
translator and he gathered together some
of the Arabs who were there at the time
and one of them happened to be Abu
Sufyan. Abu Sufyan was a cousin of the
prophet and he was the leader of Mecca
and the leader in a sense in fact of the
opposition to the prophet Muhammad and
the teachings of the prophet Muhammad in
Arabia. He was therefore the leader of
the pagans at the time and he happened
to be in Jerusalem when Heraculus
received this letter. So I'm going to
read to you that story. He called for
his translator who translating
Heraculus's question said to them, "Who
amongst you is closely related to that
man who claims to be a prophet?" And
Abul Safyan replied, "I am the nearest
relative to him." And Heraculus said,
"Bring him close to me and make his
companions stand behind him." Heraculus
told his translator to tell Abu Sufyan's
companions that he wanted to put some
questions to
me regarding that man and that if I told
a lie they should contradict me. By the
way, it's Abu Sufyan who is actually
telling this story because at a later
stage Abu Sufyan himself of course
became Muslim. So he's telling this
story in fact to Abdullah Ibin Abbas who
was an early companion of the prophet
Muhammad. May Allah's peace and
blessings be upon
him. And he's telling him this story and
Abdullah ibn Abbas records it. So there
we are there. We're in the court of
Heraculus and Heraculus is saying,
"Okay, you your companions stand behind
you and if he tells a lie, you must tell
me that he's lying." Now Abu Sufyan said
by Allah had I not been afraid that my
companions were going to label me a liar
I would have not have spoken the truth
about the prophet. So the first question
Heraculus asked asked Abu Sufyan was
this. What family status has he amongst
you? And I replied Abu Sufyan replied he
belongs to a noble family amongst us.
Then Heraculus asked, "Has anybody else
amongst you ever claimed the same before
him?" I replied, "No." "Was any amongst
his ancestors a king?" Heraculus asked.
Again, Abul Sufyan replied, "No."
Heraculus asked, "Do the nobles or the
poor follow him?" Abul Sufyan replied,
"It is the poor who follow him?"
And then the Heraculus asked, "Are his
followers increasing or
decreasing?" Absan replied, "They are
increasing." Then he asked, "Does
anybody amongst those who embraces
religion become displeased and renounce
the religion afterwards?" Abu Sufyan
replied, "No." Heraculus then said,
"Have you ever accused him of telling
lies before his claim?" Again, Abu
Sufyan says,
"No." Heraculus says, "Does he break his
truce?" Abu Sufyan replied, "No, we are
at truce with him now and we don't know
what he's going to do in it." And Abu
Sufyan said, "I could not find
opportunity to say anything against the
prophet except that time." Then
Heraculus asked, "Have you ever had a
war with him?" And he, Abu Sufyan said,
"Yes." What was the outcome of the
battles? Well, sometimes we were
victorious and sometimes he was
victorious. And then Heraculus asked,
"What does he order you to do?" And Abu
Sufyan replied, "He tells us to worship
Allah and Allah alone and not to worship
anything along with him and to renounce
all that our ancestors had said. He
orders us to pray, to speak the truth,
to be chased, and to keep good relations
with our kith and kin. Heraculist asks
the translator to convey the
following. I asked you about his family
and your reply was that he belonged to a
very noble family. In fact, all the
prophets come from noble families
amongst their respective peoples. I
questioned you whether anybody else
among you claims such a thing and your
reply was in the negative. If the answer
had been in the affirmative, I would
have suspected this man was following
the previous man's
statement. Meaning, if the prophet, if
there had been someone before him saying
he was a prophet, then the prophet
Muhammad might have just been imitating
what that other guy was saying, but no
one amongst them had ever said that
before. Then I asked you whether any of
his ancestors was a king and you said
no. If you had said yes, I would have
thought that this man was trying to take
back his kingdom. In other words, use
the mantle of prophethood to try and
take back the kingdom. Then I asked you
if he was ever accused of telling lies
before this, before his claim to
prophethood, and you said no. And then I
wondered, how can a person who never
lies to
people lie about Allah? How could a
person who never lies to people lie
about Allah? And then I asked you
whether the rich people or the poor
people follow him and you said that the
poor people follow him. And so it is
with all the prophets. They have always
been followed by that type of people.
The prophets are always followed by the
poor and the weak and the oppressed.
Then I asked you whether his followers
were increasing or decreasing. You said
they were increasing and that is the way
of true faith until it is complete in
all
respects. I further asked you if there
was anybody who after embracing his
religion became displeased and discarded
his religion and you said no. In fact,
this is the sign of true faith when its
delight enters the heart and mixes with
them completely. I asked you whether he
had ever betrayed. You said no. And so
the prophets never betray. I asked you
what he ordered you to do and you told
me that he ordered you to worship Allah
and Allah alone and not to worship
anything else along with him and forbade
you from worshiping idols and told you
to pray and to speak the truth and not
commit illegal fornication. If what you
said is true, he will very soon occupy
this place underneath my feet. And I
knew it from the scriptures that he was
going to appear. But I did not know that
he would be from you. And if I could
reach him definitely, I would go
immediately to meet him. And if I was
with him, I would wash his feet.
Heraculus then asked for the letter of
the
prophet which was delivered by Dia to
the governor of Bura and then it was
forwarded to Heraculus to read and this
is what the letter said. In the name of
Allah the beneficient the merciful from
Muhammad the slave of God and his
messenger to Heraculus the ruler of the
Bisantine. Peace be upon him who follows
the right path. Furthermore, I invite
you to Islam. And if you become a
Muslim, you will be safe and Allah will
double your reward. And if you reject
this invitation, you will be committing
a sin by misguiding your peasants. Oh
people of the scripture, come to a word
common between you and us that we
worship none but Allah and that we
associate nothing in worship with him
and that none of us should take lords
besides Allah. Then if they turn away
say bear witness that we are Muslims.
This is of course the translation of a
verse of the Quran. And Absufyan added,
"When Heraculus had finished his speech
and had read the letter, there was a
great hue and cry in the royal court and
we were turned out of the court. I said
to my
companions, surely the issue of Ibin Abi
Kaba," and that was a type of derogatory
term they used, a nickname they used for
the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam.
His affair has become so prominent that
even the king of the Baantine is afraid
of him. And then I started to become
sure that he would be the conqueror in
the near future until I embraced
Islam. Now this is really a truly
remarkable story for two reasons. First
of all, as we mentioned, and that's the
topic that we're dealing with, how
Heraculus knew that there was a prophet
still to come. From where did he know
this? How did he know this? We're going
to talk about that later. There are some
things in the Gospels that indicate that
a prophet is going to come after Jesus.
And we're going to see from the Bible
how that prophet is almost certainly the
prophet Muhammad. May God's peace and
blessings be upon him. The second thing
that is really amazing about that story
is how hiraculous this wise and
intelligent Roman emperor analyzed the
life of the prophet. Ask certain
questions to be sure in his mind. Was he
a fake or was he truthful? Did he have
the characteristics of a person who was
truly a prophet of God or was he someone
who could be not what he claimed to be?
and he found that on every single count
indeed the prophet Muhammad matched the
descriptions and the attributes of how a
prophet should be. We're going to be
talking about some more people from the
people of the book who witnessed the
truth of Muhammad's prophethood after
the break. Don't go away. Join us for
more of the proof that Islam is the
truth.
May the peace and blessings of Allah be
upon all of you and may he guide all of
us closer to the right path. Um today
we're talking about the witnessing of
the people of the book. Some truly
remarkable stories from the Jews and the
Christians, those people who lived in
the time of the prophet Muhammad, may
God's peace and blessings be upon him,
who were expecting the arrival of a
prophet. And indeed Heraculus the Roman
emperor himself or the emperor rather of
the Baantine himself uh recognized that
he was expecting a prophet. He did not
know however that this prophet was going
to be from the Arabs. But he recognized
the description of the prophethood and
the attributes and the qualities of
prophethood when he questioned Abu
Sufyan who was the cousin of the prophet
and in fact was the leader of the
opposition to the prophet Muhammad. May
God's peace and blessings be upon him at
the time. But I'd like to move back a
little bit earlier into an earlier time
in the life of the prophet and let's
talk about another great ruler at the
time and his name was Naos and he was
the in fact the king of Abbiscinia. Now
it so happened that in the early days in
Mecca the Muslims were suffering a huge
amount of oppression. In fact the pagan
Meccans were really persecuting the
Muslims terribly. A lot of them of
course were very poor people and many of
them were even slaves and women and they
were the people in society that nobody
really cared if you attacked them or
beat them or even killed them. In fact,
some of the Muslims had even been killed
due to torture and terrible things by
the leaders of Mecca and things became
so bad that they decided they had to
leave. So the prophet Muhammad may
Allah's peace and blessings be upon him
he told his followers to go to
Abbiscinia and he said there is a king
who will never do you injustice. So
anyway they migrated to Abbiscinia. Now
it happened that the Quraysh had very
good relationships with uh the
Abbisinians and knew personally the king
of Abbisinia and they sent a delegation.
Their object was to try and retrieve the
mechans who had escaped and bring them
back with them. So the Quraysh went to
the king of they sent a delegation and
they went to the king and they
complained to the king that we have
these fugitives. They have escaped their
country. They've been insulting the
religion of our ancestors and kept on
telling him stories and so on and so
forth. So anyway, Nagus uh ordered the
immigrants who had come to his country
to his court and he asked them about
their
religion and what was this claim. And um
Jaffer ibn Abu Talib who was the uh the
leader of the Muslims in in Abbiscinia
gave this very beautiful little speech
and this is how he explained their
condition to the king. He said, "Oh
king, we were an ignorant people
worshiping idols, eating, carrying and
indulging in sexual pleasures. We
ridiculed our neighbors. A brother
oppressed his brother and the strong
devoured the weak. At this time a man
rose amongst us who had already been
known to be truthful, noble and honest.
This man called us to Islam and he
taught us to give up worshiping stones
to speak the truth to refrain from from
bloodshed and not to defraud the orphans
of their property.
He taught us to provide comfort to our
neighbors and not to bring slander
against chase women. He enjoined on us
to offer the prayers, observe fasts and
give charity. We followed him, gave up
polytheism and idolatry and refrained
from all evil deeds. It is for this new
way that our people have become hostile
to us and compel us to return to our old
misguided life. Now when the king of
Abbiscinia heard that he said that there
is no way that I will return these
people to you. There is nothing that
they have done wrong and they are free
to stay and live in my kingdom. So
anyway, the Muslims left thinking that
was at the end of it. But no, the
delegation of Quraysh were not going to
give up so easily. One of them thought
to himself, I know, let's tell na what
they say about Jesus. So they went to
Nagus and they said, and he said to him,
you know, the Muslims, they don't say
that Jesus is God or the son of God.
They say he's only a prophet of God. Ask
them what they believe about Jesus and
you will see they even insult your own
religion. Anyway, ners called him back
to the court the other day and Jafferb
Abu Talib was very worried. He didn't
really know what to say, but he
determined to speak the truth and to
tell him exactly what was in the Quran.
So, Nus asked him, "What do you say
about Jesus?"
So Jaffer said, "We say what our prophet
says that he is a messenger from Allah
and his word which he bestowed upon Mary
and a spirit from
him." So this is what we believe
concerning Jesus and that he was given
the
inie. And when Nus heard
that he said
truly Jesus said nothing more than that
about
himself. What is this book that you
read? Nagus
asked and Jaffarb Abu Talib he read the
first few verses of surah Mariam which
are very very beautiful verses talking
about Jesus. And when he read these
verses, Nus began to cry and so did all
many of the assembled courtiers, even
the bishops, they began to cry because
of these beautiful words about Jesus in
the
Quran. And then Nger said, "Verily, what
your prophet has bought and what Jesus
said are two things from the same
source. You are free to stay and live in
my kingdom." In fact, this same nagus of
Abba himself converted to Islam. He most
certainly recognized the truth that
Muhammad, may Allah's peace and
blessings be upon him, was a prophet of
God. There was in Arabia one Christian.
There were not many Christians at all in
pagan Arabia, but there was one and his
name was Waraka. And he was a very
distant cousin of the prophet Muhammad.
May Allah's peace and blessings be upon
him. In fact, he was more closely
related to Khadijah who was the first
wife of the prophet and for many many
years of course his only wife. And when
the prophet Muhammad first received the
first verses of the Quran, he came down
terrified running. He he did not know
what this experience was. It was a
frightening experience to him. And he
came running to his wife. and his wife
suggested Khadijah that they should go
and visit war and see what he had to say
about this. Now Waka when he heard about
what the prophet sallallah.aii alaihi
wasallam had experienced. He said that
this is the holy spirit. This is the
angel Gabriel the spirit that comes with
the revelation that has been sent to
you. And then he went on to say surely
by him in whose hand is war. If you are
the prophet of these people and there
has come to you the greatest angel who
came to Moses, you will be called a liar
and they will use you despitefully and
cast you out and fight you. So this is
what said and he said by
Allah if Allah gives me life I will most
certainly follow you. In fact Waraka
died very soon after that. But we also
want to talk about the Jewish community.
There was a Jewish community, quite a
large Jewish community that lived in
Arabia and some of those people had
specifically immigrated because they
were expecting in Arabia the coming of
the last prophet. In fact, out of the
rabbis of Medina, half of them actually
became
Muslim. And one of the very famous and
most learned of the rabbis of Medina was
Abdullah Ibn Salam. In fact, he said
concerning the prophet Muhammad, may
Allah's peace and blessings be upon him,
we knew your name and we knew the time
and the place of your coming. And he
accepted Islam. In fact, when he
accepted Islam, he said to the prophet
sallallah.aii wasallam, "Oh messenger of
Allah, the Jews are a very tricky
people. So let us test them before we
announce my embracing Islam." So what he
did is he gathered all the Jews and he
got the prophet Muhammad to talk to them
and the prophet Muhammad may Allah's
peace and blessings be upon him asked
the Jews he said to them what would you
say if Abdullah ibn Salam became Muslim
they said may Allah protect us from that
he will never become Muslim said well
what do you think of him he said he's
the best of us and the most
knowledgeable person amongst us and he
is the wisest amongst us he would never
become Muslim and again the prophet said
what would you say if he became Muslim
they said No, he will never become
Muslim. May Allah protect us from that.
And when they said that the third time,
then
Abdullahb stepped out from where he was
hiding. He
saidd and when he said that, then the
Jews started saying, "He is the most
ignorant amongst us and he's the worst
amongst us and he's the least one to
know anything amongst us." So they
completely changed their tune once he
had become Muslim. But Abdullah ibn
Salam was one of the very famous Jews
and the Jewish rabbis who converted to
Islam in the time of the prophet
Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam
because he recognized that Muhammad was
the person that had been foretold in his
scriptures. We're going to have some
more fantastic stories and amazing
histories of those people of the book
who converted to Islam based on their
knowledge of the prophecies of the
prophet Muhammad in the Bible. And we're
going to be detailing some of those in
our next episode. So don't forget to
join us for the proof that Islam is the
truth.
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