Alhamdulillah. Assalamu alaykum. Peace
be unto you. Today we're going to be
talking with our teacher, our sheh,
who's here to help us understand Islam,
the way of all the prophets, that way of
submission and surrender. Not to your
desires, not to a man, not to a woman,
but the one who created man and woman,
the creator of the heavens and the
earth. We're going to be trying to
distinguish Islam
from back home cultures.
It's kind of got intertwined. You got
some things, some confusion. So, we want
to make sure that we have the blueprint
because we want to do things right. We
want to do things according to how the
creator wants us to do things. We don't
want to follow our desires and get even
more confused. So to help unravel the
confusion when we come back, Shake Tophi
Chri here on the Dean Show. Be right
back.
Allah
there's only one word
is his messenger. Allah
Allah
there's only one God and Jesus was his
messenger Allah
I don't know why I did that maybe it's
just to break the ice
how are you
very good thank you
thank you very much for being with us
that's great no problem
how have you been
very good thank Thank you.
I'm very excited that you're back with
us here on the Dean Show.
I know you're very busy traveling,
educating the people.
I try to be. Thank you.
Dedicated your life to this beautiful
way of life Islam.
Wahi, you know, uh I'm actually
indebted indebted to Allahh, to my
families, to my parents for actually
being able to do it, you know.
And you were last time as we spoke, you
were also pursuing your doctorate
degree, is that correct?
Yeah. in medicine. Yes.
So I can call you Dr. Chri now. Huh?
Uh I prefer you not to just call me
brother.
That's right. Okay. So my my uh sheh our
teacher tell us now
we need to understand a little better
because people know that Islam is that
way of life. The way of life of all the
messengers. That way of submitting
yourself entirely to the creator of the
heavens and earth.
Yes. But now we have some things that
are cultural practices. So there might
be some confusion to some of the lay
people because now there's some things
that might have developed over the years
and have gotten mixed up with Islam. So
we want to talk about a basic blueprint
so we don't get to mixing things up like
a buffet. So what is culture and what is
accepted with the normal cultures of
society and what is clear Islam and what
can mix and what can't mix. Let's talk
about this for a second.
Right. It's I think a really really good
question because unfortunately what's
happened these days is that uh people
have obviously been born into Muslim
families and because of the the ultimate
the total lack of of Islamic education
uh and the fact that people don't even
know the basics of their religion
sometimes yes
people have forgotten the the difference
between what is culture and what is
Islam. So we find for example um in
Muslim countries these days uh people
pray not because they really want to
pray or because it's in their heart to
pray uh but really it's because it's
culture you know it's time to pray the
adan's coming
you know what do people generally do
they just go to the mosque and pray so
we might as well do that yes
or people for example wear the hijab not
because it's uh it's they're actually
doing it because to really want to
protect themselves from others
or to or to really be covered for the
sake of Allah subhana wa ta'ala but
they're doing it simply because it's
part of the culture and hijab uh has
just become a convenient way of dressing
to to cover up your uh you know yourself
and so in reality we need to break that
barrier and to break that barrier uh a
lot of education needs to happen uh a
lot of uh u dawa needs to happen the
people who do know the truth need to go
out and actually say that to people uh
and a lot of uh clarity needs to come
into the whole picture of exactly what
basic amount of knowledge needs to be
there in the minds of people so that you
can break the difference. So that really
depends upon the society that we're
talking about. Uh we know that in Islam
a certain amount of basic knowledge is
obligatory upon every single person. So
what is that basic amount of knowledge
that is obligatory on every person?
Well, we know that we need to know the
basics of our belief. We need to know
the basics of our actions, the things
that we need to do. We need to know the
basics of any action that the community
or the people do. uh that that they're
involved in. Like for example, before
they do business, they need to know
about the rulings of business. Before
they deal in marriage and divorce, they
need to know the rulings of marriage and
divorce.
Yes.
So ultimately, every believer is
required to know a certain set basic
amount of belief uh knowledge in in
a certain basic amount of knowledge in
belief and a certain basic amount of
knowledge in action. And when this is
clear in people's minds, then the
delineation between what is religion and
what is culture will become far more
clearer because the problem is happening
in in that the most basic things people
are mixing up with their culture.
So we know for example these days uh you
know female circumcision as let me give
you that example female circumcision
which is practiced in the African
countries in a way in which the whole
clitoris and the whole female genital
external genitals are actually removed.
This is something which is totally
against the principles of Islam.
Uh because the goal they say is to not
let women
have excessive desire. Right. That's the
understanding that is usually given.
Yeah.
Uh although in Islam there is no basis
for total removal of the of the
genitalia at all
because it's something cultural.
That is cultural. That is a practice and
African practice that has come into
Islam.
Yeah.
Uh not come into Muslims and they
practice. Right. In the same way like
for example you might say in India uh
the example is that in India we know the
Hindus uh when they used to marry their
daughters off they had to give money to
the husbands.
Mhm.
Whereas in Islam it's other way around.
In in Islam the the men have to give a
dowy or a marriage gift to the to the
women.
It's not the opposite.
Not the opposite. Not the opposite. And
I know for example even my own parents
they're Muslims right? Yes. And when
they got married, it was almost like my
parents, my mom had to give a gift to my
dad. Although my dad didn't accept it,
but the point was it was almost
expected.
Mhm.
As a cultural practice. And we have
many, many similar cultural practices in
many things, whether it be times of
death, times of marriage, times of
divorce, times of, you know, prayer and
worship, you know, whether it be in our
in our Hajj and Omrah. We have so many
things which actually cultural practices
that really need to be rooted out and
the best way to do that is through
education.
Now we put a little flavoring in our
coffee. You get the latte, put a little
caramel.
If your steak needs a little bit of
salt, you know, to amplify the taste.
Mhm.
What about with our way of life? This
religion or you you want to sweeten up
uh you know your tea, you put some extra
sugar,
right? But if someone argue and said,
you know, we're just trying to add some
flavor here. We're just trying to, you
know, spice things up.
Yeah. You know what? Uh there are two
problems here. The first problem is that
you actually believe that Islam is
actually deficient
or the taste is actually not good enough
for you.
You actually need to sweeten it up or
something like that, right? That's
actually claiming that the religion is
deficient.
Would you agree? That's actually
claiming that the religion needs a
version too
or that we need to improve certain
things about the religion which is not
just to our taste or something.
That would be claiming that the prophet
did not give his message to us that the
Quran is not complete that Allah subhana
did not complete the religion and that
would be a tremendous tremendous thing
to say. Would you agree? Yes. This is
why innovation something that is new
into the religion is so disliked in our
in our dean because not that we don't
really want do want to do good for the
religion. What we're saying is is that
by actually adding something you're
actually claiming something else. You're
claiming that it's deficient. You're
claiming that the that that just like
the food is needs salt so the religion
needs needs something else. And you have
the audacity to say that you think the
religion is not complete. Okay, that's
the first problem. The second problem is
that you you you're claiming that the
religion doesn't have the sweetness or
the religion doesn't have the joy that
you're looking for. And that's that's to
say that that Islam, you know, and we we
hear this sometimes people say that, you
know, religion is all boring, you know,
it's not all it's not, you know, and we
want some fun in it and there's just no
fun in in Islam. Well, the reality is,
you know what, you haven't approached uh
Islam in the right way. You have looked
at Islam as a set of rigid laws and
guidelines. You haven't looked beyond
that. You haven't looked at the beauty
of thinking about Allah. You haven't
thought about the sweetness of basking
in the love of Allah. You even thought
about like for example I remember mashh
was uh he was asked a question by a man
and a man was I've been trying to get
married and you know I can't get married
and and I'm having this this tremendous
difficulty and he gave a talk
that till now I remember and he spoke
about how a person whose heart is
engrossed in the remembrance of Allah
finds no need for physical pleasures.
Yeah.
Right. And by Allah, you know, someone
whose heart is in in total bliss,
thinking about Allah, the day that he
will meet him, the day the day in which
he will speak to him alone and he is
standing sitting and lying thinking
about God and the creation of the
heavens and the earth. The one who
ponders about the day, the first night
in the grave, don't think about the
second night in the grave. Just the
first night in the grave, the one who
pers about it. Well, Allah, he is filled
with a different sort of thought in his
mind, a different sort of attention
span. He has a different sort of outlook
towards his life and he is he doesn't
waste his time looking for distractions.
Mhm.
Because these things are sometimes mere
mere distractions. We're not saying that
in Islam there's no enjoyment. By the
way, we're saying that there is
tremendous enjoyment. Yeah.
The prophetam would would have
competitions with his wives. He would
joke around with his wives. In one of
the narrations we hear that the
prophetam was sitting with one of his
legs and one in the house of one of his
wives, another leg in the house of
another wife. And and then um
She cooked a nice meal of of something
called
which which is uh meat cooked with uh
bread in a curry. Yeah. And she brought
that toam. And the prophet wasallam ate
a little bit. And then he offered it to
Safia who was the other wife ofam. And
Safy said, "I'm sorry. I've already
eaten." And so Aisha said, "No, you're
definitely going to eat." And she said,
"No, I'm sorry. I've eaten." And so
Aisha took the food like this, a little
bit of food,
and she threw it at Sophia and landed on
her nose.
And it's true. It's an authentic hadith,
by the way. And so what do you think the
prophet did? And he also took some food
and he threw it at Aisha.
They're having fun.
They're having fun. No, don't have a big
foot food fight.
What we're saying is just harmless fun.
Yeah.
Harmless fun. Yep.
Yes. So So tell us now. Okay. You know,
we see other faiths, they do things to
bring the people in. So if the masids
are empty and you got some people
wanting to be creative, maybe we can
bring a band in the masid. What about
this things like of this nature?
Yeah. Um you know u there are certain
things in Islam I mean there's a
difference between innovation and public
good.
Yeah. So we know that when the prophet
wasallam passed away and the Quran was
in different parts in different areas
the Quran wasn't collected in one go. So
the person can say hey the people put
the Quran into one into one piece and
they were all different parts.
Uh why is that allowed and why can't I
try and do something which would be for
the public which would bring more good
to people just like you said bring more
people back into the mosque so you know
start all these competitions and all
these other things. So you're talking
about
cuz you see it you know you go one
church is competing with the next. So
one brings a rap band, the other one
brings a hip-hop band and then uh it's a
competition and they're filling them up
somehow to keep the memberships coming
in. So the Muslims see this and maybe
they say, "Hey, we can get some good
ideas."
Absolutely. So what we're saying is
uh is that there's no problem with
helping Islam as long as as it is within
the realms and the guidelines of Islam.
Now we know that for example, of course,
bands and music and dancing and free
mixing, etc., this is not something
condoned by Islam. But the point is what
if someone said okay let's just not do
something openly haram but what about
doing something openly halal like for
example like the prophet's birthday for
example let's celebrate the prophet's
birthday even even though the prophet
didn't do that
so and people would justify that but by
saying that hey this is
increasing the love foram but we try and
we we we look at it objectively we say
hey there's a difference between public
good and and and innovation in in in
something that that is for the public
good.
Mhm.
Uh it is first of all condoned by Islam.
Okay. Second of all, a public good is
something which does not increase the
hardship upon us. If if anything, it
decreases hardship upon us.
Thirdly, the public good is something
that that conforms to the goals and
principles of the Sharia. On the other
hand, an innovation is something which
increases hardship upon us. and an
innovation the reason for its existence
already would have existed in the time
of but the prophet didn't do so. Mhm.
So therefore for us to claim that we
need to do something else
to do more right would be an innovation
because the cause for it existence
already existed at the time of
so so for example we could say you know
the need for mankind to love Allah also
existed far more in the time of Allah
wasam so why should we now celebrate the
prophet birthday when the prophet didn't
do so at that time even though the need
existed at that time
do you understand what I'm saying yes
so therefore the point is my
uh that we can try and and use 101 ideas
to increase uh you know membership of
Islam. We can use 101 different ways and
strategies to bring people back into the
deen as long as number one it doesn't go
against our principles.
Yeah.
And our values and number two number two
as long as it's not real clear
innovation in the dean.
So so now just so the viewers will
understand what we're saying here is
that knowledge is key. So whatever is in
the blueprint, this is what we follow.
And no one can bring something in that's
not sanctioned by the creator and his
last and final messenger, the prophet
Muhammad peace be upon him.
Absolutely. Because you know, one of the
things that uh that's really important
to understand is that if a if a religion
doesn't have any firm principles and
basis and and values,
it's not a religion at all. You see, the
problem with Christianity these days is
that they're redefining the values
straight away. They're redefining the
principles. Yeah.
What is set values and set principles
and set guidelines
and then everything else can can
therefore be looked into about you know
adding adding certain certain uh
strategies in order to bring people in
as long as the values are right as long
as the principles are there as long as
these things are are are clear and and
set
in stone. Do you understand what I'm
saying?
Yeah.
Otherwise you have no ideology. So it's
okay now if somebody wants to invent a
better way to communicate through some
kind of uh superduty cell phone or
someone wants to invent a car that goes
faster. This is okay.
Absolutely.
This kind of technology this kind of
development innovation is okay.
Absolutely.
But in the matters of this perfect way
of life, Islam, the religion, me and you
can't spice it up a little bit. We can't
do anything that we think now we're
doing better than the creator.
You know what? And if if there was, you
know, we could just follow what we
wanted to do,
there would be no need to send a
prophet.
Okay.
There' be no need to give us a book that
would never change.
Yeah.
Right. There would be no need to give us
a isnad or a chain of narration by which
we know that our uh our our statements
foram are correct.
Yeah.
There' be no need for all of this. Mhm.
We could have just invented what we
thought was right, what we felt was
right, what we knew was right.
Okay. So, we're we're starting to
understand a little better a few more
points before we come to an end because
this is a very important issue because
you can see as other people of other
faiths just to get the congregation from
leaving. They'll do juggling tricks,
magicians, bands,
all sorts of things. And from one church
to the next or one place to the next,
everything is different. But in Islam,
it's the perfect way of life. Everything
is there. You just have to follow,
submit.
Yeah. You know, the ends don't justify
the means. In Islam, right?
The ends do not justify the means. And
this is really, really important.
You know, in Christianity and all these
other things we're seeing these days,
sometimes they're saying, "Hey, the ends
will justify the means."
Yeah.
And they don't even think about the
values that they're losing out because
of this. The principles that they're
overlooking because of this.
You know what I'm saying? All these are
values and principles are set in set in
stone. It's not important to just get
there. It's important how we get there
as well.
Gotcha. So, some closing comments and
suggestions for those who sincerely want
to follow this way of life, how it has
been ordained by the creator of the
heavens and earth and they don't want to
get into things that have been added by
man. Give some advice to that sincere
individual, those individuals, please. I
think my sincere advice to those people
who really want to follow this follow
the truth would be to realize that Islam
is evidence-based.
Okay. In medicine, you know, when we
practice medicine before we come to a
patient and we want to give them the
right medicine, we don't just say, "Hey,
you know what? It's it's great to just
give him give any med medicine, but
rather we give them the medicine
that is evidence-based, that is evidence
behind it. We've tried it on hundreds of
patients. We know it to work vast
majority of the of the time. 95% 99% of
the time. So we know this is right. For
example, so for example, you just have a
common cold. We're not going to give you
antibiotics because vast majority of
common cold 60% of the time it's
viruses. Right? You understand what I'm
saying? So in the same way, Islam is
evidence-based. The prophetam kept on
focusing on that. Allah says in the
Quran
or you believe if a untrustworthy person
comes to you with information then
verify it. We know in Islam for example,
we don't just accept any hadith, any
narration. We accept a hadith that is
authentic because it has a chain of
narration back to Allah. So what I'm
saying is Islam is about knowledge. The
first word word revealed to was read.
The Quran comes from the word to read.
So the and the greatest miracle of the
prophet was a book that is meant to be
read.
Yeah.
So our dean is about knowledge. It's
about evidence-based and our practice is
evidence-based. We don't just practice
anything. We practice based on the
evidence of the Quran and from the
authentic sunnah that has been proven
directly to be authentic and from the
prophetam. What can give us more
satisfaction than that? Knowing that we
are following something that is
evidence-based. In the same way when we
help patients we know it's evidence-
based. We have we have certainty in our
heart that you know what we're doing the
best thing we can for the patient. In
the same way we should be with the
religion. How can we follow a book? How
can we follow a ruling that we don't
know the evidence for? Mhm.
Right. And this is my advice to people.
Whenever you do things, do it
evidence-based.
Thank you very much. May God Almighty,
the creator, Allah reward you. The
pleasure is all mine.
I hope you got to benefit. I surely did.
This is something that's very simple. If
it's sanctioned by the creator of the
heavens and earth, if there's a basis
for it, the last and final messenger
sent to mankind, the prophet Muhammad.
He explained it to us. He taught it to
us in matters of dean religion. then we
do it. We submit to it. Otherwise, we
don't need it. And with that said, we'll
see you next time here on the Dean Show.
Asalamikum. Peace be unto you.
[Music]
for
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Leah. for
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soch.
[Music]
Fore!
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Foreign! Foreign!
Fore
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fellow.
[Music]
The DVDs for da is Allah has said in the
Quran in surah 16125m
invite all to the way of your lord with
wisdom beautiful preaching and reason
with them in ways that are best. And
this is a great opportunity for you to
take up the obligation, take up the call
as Allah has told you to do and share
this beautiful message with the world.
Islam, submission to the one God.
Come and see what everyone's talking
about.
If you find one contradiction, it can't
be from God.
But the rational idea, the rational
explanation is you do your best.
Give up worshiping God as one. I will
never give up spreading this message. I
hope that you take that necessary step.
You don't know if you're going to live
till tomorrow.
So, you got to find that urgency to do
the right thing right now.
If you say that you do not believe in
Jesus, you have stepped outside of
Islam. You cannot be a Muslim. It is
attended our faith to
It's cold, it's lame,
everybody sleeping.
I arise
and ask Allah to forgive me.
Oh Allah, you see,
oh Allah, you know
all the sins I do.
I turn to you to forgive my sins in my
heart.
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I'm your sinful slave.
You're my loving Lord.
I'm the one who runs away.
Oh Allah, guide me.