A look into the oft-neglected aspect of marital relationships within the Islamic faith.
AbdelRahman Murphy – Romance & Islam
AI: Summary ©
The American Association of American Center for Lawing and Lawing (AAC) discusses various events and events happening at the American Association of American Center for Lawing and Lawing (AAC). They explain the definition of love in Islam, the cultural and political misunderstandings of love, and the importance of healthy romantic expressions of love. They also discuss the cultural context of Moore's Law and the importance of respect and intimacy in relationships. The speakers emphasize the importance of personal comfort and maintaining respect and intimacy in relationships.
AI: Summary ©
Everyone, thank you for joining Association and the Asian American cultural center.
romance and love. Before I introduce the speaker, I just wanted to talk about our events for the rest of the week. On Wednesday, we will be having a crime recitation in translation in Lincoln Hall 1002, from seven to eat. And Thursday will be where I get job day and girls who can come pick up a free hot scarf and wear for the whole day. And there will be a discussion at the Women's Resource Center following afterwards from 830 to 10pm. And also there will be a lecture for about women
in the life team from seven to 8pm. So be sure to attend those events. And
we are really lucky to have Robert Murphy today to share this valuable and expansive insight on this topic, romance and love brother,
a youth minister
of Knoxville, he's an instructor at Columbia Institute and currently working towards a master's in counseling and family
therapy, please give a warm welcome to father.
Greetings to you all.
I mean,
all you understood that so we're going to go forward, okay. For those who didn't understand.
It was a it was a brief prayer, thanking God, for all the buttons that gave us
the blessings that we know of, and that we don't know, because there's a lot of blessings that we don't know about, until they're taken away, or you don't know.
There's a lot of people who encounter blessings by surprise, for instance, who came for extra credit, and thought others will be free food.
Always good thing.
So we thank God for all the blessings and we and we, that's the essence of worshiping God is gratitude for everything that he gave us. And we also asked God to send his peace and blessings and special graces upon the final messengers, mankind.
Muhammad, peace be upon him. And we ask God to make us amongst those who follow this beautiful example.
This topic is really interesting. I think that what's interesting about love in general, is that it's kind of a universal language, it doesn't really have major many or major restrictions to it. So it kind of culturally, you know, can in a global atmosphere, people can talk about love, or advertising discussion on love, and everyone will show up, right? Because this is something that and we believe in our condition. The word fun in Arabic means what?
Your heart, but actually the word fun in fun lava in the Arabic on verbal tense, used to flip me switch means to flip over is a very interesting thing. The hardest, extremely interesting thing and it flips a lot. I think that's why everyone likes to come and discuss because everyone's trying to find the magic formula. Right? How can I control the way my heart feels, or the way someone else's heart feels about me? And
really, if you came here for that, I'm going to disappoint you because the search is never ending. But I did want to highlight some points about love in Islam. A lot of you maybe or maybe not. How many of you are Muslim?
I mean, you're
taking us out of the prison. No kidding.
Fox News I'm done. Okay.
So, a lot of people might be surprised that a religion would discuss a topic like love I think some people would be a little confused that something you know, something like a deity or a messenger from God will discuss the topic of what love is. But really this is kind of part and parcel of the definition of what a Deen is and the Arabic language we believe as Muslims, right? That our faith is not simply a faith that is to be part time to full time thing, right you sign up for all the time. It's a way of life more than it is a religion. Right. And and part of that you get guidance from your religion on different aspects. You know, in Islam, we're taught guidance on dealing with
business transaction. We're taught how to treat people that we're doing business with. In the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon said that if any Muslim person cheats a non Muslim business, then on the Day of Judgment, that the problem hunger will stand as a witness against the Muslim person showing what, that the religion doesn't dictate justice. The religion doesn't dictate who gets justice and who doesn't. universally people deserve what is right. And so the religion of Islam teaches us what he says about business transactions. It teaches us about
you know, treatment of coworkers treatment of family teaches us that there's a there's an adage that's attributed to the problem hook economists as that have enlightened under the feet of the mother. And if any of you are mothers, if any of you have realized and recognize the difficulty of being a mother, then this narration makes a lot of sense, right? We're taught even about personal hygiene. Now the Prophet peace be upon him guiding people on personal hygiene. And he also talks about love, which without personal hygiene, you're probably not
getting that order.
Counter personal hygiene before we ask her out on a date.
So despite popular belief, you know, we look at Islam, and we see the Muslim tradition, the Muslim faith, and despite popular belief about what it entails and what it discusses, you find that Islam does encourage a very healthy definition of what love should be, as someone who's studying to become a licensed professional counselor, who does a lot of counseling, a lot of reading about therapy and Family Development and personal development. I find that these transit translations of what love is are very, are very comparable, very parallel very,
in the Quran, in the Holy Scripture, which is considered to be like a third part of the Return of the Jedi of the Abrahamic faith, right? So you got like Star Wars Empire Strikes Back. We don't want all three lyrical story.
You know, Allah, God describes love in many different ways, right, and there's a lot of different Arabic words that are used. So for those who don't understand Arabic, I'm going to translate it, but I need to first explain to you about the Arabic language. The Arabic language existed before the Quran was sent or revealed to the Prophet Muhammad existed. And the Arabic language is extremely deep, there's no such thing as a synonym in your language. There may be two things that direct to the same meaning, but the connotation of the translation will give you different feelings. Right give you different feelings. For example, the word folk and the words in the word, well, there's the
word from has two meanings. The word COVID means what love means love. But there's also another meaning right have that a word is similar in its root, which means
a see what means love, two, very good, right?
I mean, love, but it also means a seed. And the reason why the Arabs would choose sometimes two different definitions for the same word was because they shared a meeting. And just like a seed, you have to plant it in the dirt, little bit of water, sunlight, right? let it grow. The Arabs understood that love also needed nurturing to grow, that it wasn't something that was just like transplanting a pot, a potted plant, but rather you had to plant it. And sometimes you have to plant things in dirt, which means what you have to do some difficulty. And then after planting the dirt, you have to feed it and how do you see love dates, movie nights, gifts, things like that, and then
it grows. So the Arabic language is very deep in its translation is understanding. So when I tell you about these words, realize that they have a profound impact. Right, so the word second in Java, he says he created or he ordained marriage and love between two spouses for the reason of subpoena the test to lay hands so that it may give you Sakina So again, the Arabic language means two things. Number one, it means home. Right? So we gave you love so that you can find a place to live No, that doesn't seem right. The other translation was as accurate is tranquility what's the relationship between home and tranquility everyone?
when you're when you're at home, you're tranquil when you're home you're tranquil right? When you go home by the way doesn't have to be your literal house, you can you can find a coffee shop could be home for some people, the library for a lot of you during exam week becomes home for you, right you set up camps there, right, temporary Occupy movement. So
language peace and tranquility shares a definition with home and this is the exact definition that God Himself gave for the purpose of love that the purpose of love is to provide both participants in his in a relationship, a sense of peace, a sense of tranquility.
It was also described as
mercy, these mercy so the purpose of love is also to give a sense of mercy to someone right and in order to express love completely. You have to have mercy and if you've ever been in your relationship,
romantic relationship
you've been there right? Isn't mercy part and parcel colic, the whole experience? Because mistakes will be made. You're taking two completely different people. You're saying, Come on, get together, and they have different patterns, different routines, different different, you know, kind of sort of habits, and in that when people make mistakes or people can
flicked a clash, mercy is necessary for enforcing the equation. So God Himself is at the mercy Nelson says you need Melinda which means love. But it's not just pure love because what's the other word for love?
There's two different words for love now is a love that grows. Melinda is a love that is never ending and unconditional. So God is saying in order to have a successful relationship, right, and then the Islamic tradition, that relationship is within the parameters of marriage, right? But in order to have a successful relationship, God says you need to have to be trained, you need to be tranquilizing, not with a dark but like romantic with each other. Right? You need to give tranquility to one another, need to be merciful with one another. Right? That's part and parcel of the package. And you need to have unconditional love. Unconditional, right?
To Love you.
Love this thing.
Right? It happens, right? It happens. And so you need to have those three things. This is what God himself has described. And I find in my books, when I talk about relationship building, personal development and love, these are the kind of definitions that I find even in the western secular definition of the concept. Now, what's interesting is that when you look at the Koran, and you look at the life of the Prophet,
and these are the two generally these are the two legislative powers that we have in the religious faith is the Koran, which is the Scripture, and the Sunda which is the practitioner of that scripture by the prophet. So you have the drawn, and then you have the prophet who was described by his wife, as
a walking cross, someone who lived the message so strongly that his life became a legislative power, right? And so the reason you look at these two sources, you find that the Quran is not very strict about what and how to treat your spouse. It doesn't say if you love your wife buy her a Gucci handbag, it doesn't say that. Right? A lot of girls
say if you love your if you love your husband buy him you know, a Ferrari doesn't say anything, but it says is treat them with goodness, there's a reason why they there's a reason why it's vague. Because when things are restricted, then you create copycats, you create a sort of like limited definition and scope of what love can be. And we find this in the pop culture in the media like in the globalized effort of like pop culture media, we find that we have our definitions of love defined by certain things. Can anyone raise your hand Tell me what is love defined by the current damage?
Money, money to pay some money can define love, but who is who is shaping our definition of love? What is shaping who What?
How do very good What else?
Who
made it who people collateral?
Any population, okay? So like societal norms, culture, culture can dictate a very good
reality being
beautiful.
More like the music, but your reality Hollywood I really appreciate. You know, there's one girl actually I do a youth study circle every Sunday.
And we talked about love when people talk about love and logic is
like, no, no.
This girl Have you guys ever seen what's the movie is a coffee
with
his girl.
We were talking about love. We're talking about love in my in my ukoliko, which is the Muslim worker with a circle. And these kids were like, Yeah, tell me what you want your love to be loved. Right? And this girl goes, I want my love and be like, PS I love you. And I was like, let me get this straight. She's like, 16 Let me get this straight. You want the guy that you haven't met yet? To die? And then send you letters from the grave? And you haven't even She's so nice. I was like, no like, and you can see how this has molded and shaped her idea of what love is a lot of kids were like, I want my spouse to be like my dad. It's my mom, you know, he takes care of her. He gets
whatever she needs. Like, that's good, good, healthy role model, right? And then a lot of kids were like, a little bit pushing into some movie references. Yeah, like Ryan Gosling in the notebook. I can agree with his arthrosc, right?
That's fine. But once you start pushing it to the realm of not real anymore, right, not not even, not even based off of reality more that it becomes dangerous. And what happens is we limit what can be called love. You limit there's a book called The Five Love Languages. And this book, if any of you are in any relationship, and all of us are in some sort of relationship may not be romantic, it could be platonic. Everyone needs to read this book. This book talks about sharpening your communication in two ways in giving and receiving so that you're able to give communication in a way that's healthy and receive it in a way that's healthy because everyone has different ways to
communicate.
Right, what happens is when you listen to Justin Bieber and Taylor Swift and Kelly Clarkson, who broke up with like 3000,
boyfriends and really angry and listened to, you know one direction, you find that they're very limited in the scope of what they allowed to be loved. And it's not their fault. They're trying to make money off the 12 year old girl, that's fine.
But the unintended consequence of that is that we are reality begins to be confined. Right? And there's a reason why when I look at the definition of love in the Muslim tradition, you find it to be very vague. The Prophet himself said, when your wife calls you, or your husband calls you say about your service, the bait in Arabic very sweetly of saying what I'm here for you to meet girl, right?
It's a really like, nice way of saying that, right? doesn't limit it doesn't limit it.
You know, there's a lot of stories from the life of the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon that are very interesting. Where he would, they would be on a caravan, a trade caravan. And he and his wife would kind of like, you know,
hit the brakes a little bit on the camels, and they were pulled back a little bit, and then we get off the camels new race in the desert against each other. And this happened twice the first time she beat him, because she was like, you know, guys are a little bit bigger, the more the more weight to carry. And she was she was younger and Spry. So she beat him right. And she kept like poking fun at him like yourself old slow as beat you. Then they were passing by that same place years later, and they got off the camel again, they raced and he heard he said this one for that one being like one on one side now, right 5050 you find that these are great examples, but you never ever limited. You
never ever said this is how you love and this is not how you love your spouse never ever said. And so we find that this is a very healthy way to do so.
And the spouse tradition, you find that
there's there's oftentimes a big confusion. And this is this is part of the downfall of love and Islamism, finally, confusion and a blurring of the line between culture and religion. You find that oftentimes culture can dictate what is acceptable, and what is not acceptable in the lines of marriage. You know,
there is narrations talking about how you define him. The first thing he would do when he entered his house would give his wife a kiss. And the last or the first The last thing you would do before leaving his house would be here's what the kids how many Muslim households. Have you ever seen your mom dad?
right
away and like, it's funny cuz I was gonna be walking and I'm a youth minister, I represent the mosque. And so when I walked with my wife, like, I'll hold her hand, and her dad never held her mom's hand in public, although they love each other very much, but culturally wouldn't accept it, right?
He said openly in front of all this guy friends. Do you ask him if you're watching the bears beat the Jacksonville Jaguars or the Dallas Cowboys, right? Or whoever you're checking in with your homies. Your girlfriend, your wife walks in, and you're like, Hey, guys, hold on. You're all laughing about Tony Romo. 13th interception. And you're like, you're like, I love you. You imagine what he would do?
In public in public, very openly in front of his companions and friends is like we walked by the guys I love you. Right? There's your money. Oh, she's one of my children like I love you.
And he was in trouble. He was in the doghouse.
Right now there's a there's a specific character he
had that he the way he treated people was so well that they all thought they were his favorite. You guys all have that friend thinks of your best friend.
Right? So one time this is a very beautiful story one time this man came
out of the house he said he was bragging to all of the companions of Prophet of Gods you want to get close to him? Right? What do you mean a celebrity someone famous in your heart, you want to become a dear to them. So I was talking to the other companions. And he was like, on his favorite for sure. And they're like, why? And he was I do it because he he talks to me takes me off to lunch. All these things like I'm his favorite. So like funny you really think your favorite song? Like that's normal? Dude, he does that with all of us.
Right
there, like if you really think if you really think that he's your favorite or your favorite once you ask him, okay, in front of all of us.
So the monkeys want to walk by and he says yes to a lot on messenger of God. Who is your favorite? Who's your favorite? Who's your favorite person? And he says, his wife,
everyone. And then he goes no prophet, we know that your wife is your favorite or was our favorite we know right?
But in the romantic realm, right.
Who is your favorite? And he says, Abu
Bakar bunker. bunker was the province. They were like, they were like tight, right? You didn't even refer to her father by her father's name. You refer to your father in reference.
So instead of saying my second favorite is, he said,
because his love was just overwhelming to spilling over out of his heart that he didn't even reference his best friend bodies were actually beautiful stories, right? extremely beautiful stories. And you find that that love is reciprocated. I do this a lot, but it's really fun
to volunteer.
So there's, the story is narrated.
So, there's a story that's narrated for the Prophet. Yeah, no. Okay.
storage area where the problem is to find him. There is a young group of addisonian men, right? I've seen everything was in Africa, and even back then Black people are better dancers. Okay, so
let's be honest, it's a different kind of
applicants. So I have the right to say
that the deck of cards, unfortunately, was not the genetic part.
So they were, they were dancing, and they were dancing. They were doing a traditional kind of dance to get a cultural traditional dance they do. And
his wife wanted to see it.
And the puppet was, like, you know, kind of like, you guys
coming up, and you're like, Okay, you're right. Like some nice restaurant. And they go in and we get this art piece.
Right?
This is kind of reaction, he was like, Okay, I guess we can watch it. What happens is, these are the dancers over here, you go to dancing, right? And D is gonna play the part of the part. Now if it was shorter than the profit, right? So
what happens is, what happens is she's watching from over his shoulder, you see this a lot, you go to concerts, you go to like different like football games, and stuff like that. You see, like, you know, the guy and the girl, the husband, the wife, the person that really people are really looking like holding each other and watching each other. So she was watching her shoulder, and she narrating this story after he passed away. So there's no really no reason for her to embellish, right? There's no reason for an imbalance. So she says, we were watching the embassy and dancers and I put my chin on his shoulder. And we were so close that his cheek was touching my teeth.
Now was shorter than the Prophet. So have you ever done like, like, tiptoe squat before we have to like
it difficult, right? So she's shorter, so she can obviously put her face.
Right. Now, what happens if your tippy toes without any sort of support? forward, right? So we can all imagine that she was like this.
They're watching the dancers. And
any male in the relationship or husband would do after like, 37 seconds? He would say,
or, you
know,
watching and then after a while, he says, No. And then one more time. And then she says, Yes, right. And then they leave. And that's the whole situation after his death.
After that, after the death.
After death, she's telling the story, they're reminiscing about their marriage and things like that much like a lot of couples do, when one passes away, or they get separated.
And she says, you know, she says, You know what, the funny thing is about that whole story, she goes, I had no interest in watching the dancers. She was I just wanted my cheat to be understood.
Right. And that's, that's, that's the amount of love is reciprocated. And again, culturally, it's tough. It is tough. And you find this, by the way, not only Muslim culture, do you find this amongst the Hindu Indians,
Chinese, Japanese, many Eastern cultures, you find that public expressions of love, not PDA, not that nasty stuff that happened in high school hallways.
But just just wholesome, healthy public expressions of love are oftentimes very limited. And in Islam, this isn't the case. You know, Islam is not what is taught in Islam. As an expression of love, a healthy expression of healthy love is taught in India, it's taught that it's part and parcel of a very good romantic relationship. And so that's all I have to say. I really like basing a lot of my discussions around q&a because I feel like I can only talk for so long and then it begins to get boring my jokes get leaner and labor and so I'll just stop on the head and Charlotte, thank you all for coming. And if anyone has any questions, we'll be more than happy to yield them right now.
is always happened so for the first like 27 minutes, no one is gonna end but I just finished the public area.
Right, okay. So let's say you know, the person
initiating some
confusion
Gotcha. Okay, so this is so this is an event, right? So this is an event that's supposed to teach people about the truth definitions and meanings of Islamic concepts. So I'm gonna go ahead and define your question for everyone here, we're gonna understand why your stone paper.
And Islam were taught that a relationship between a man and female is a very honorable and dignified thing. And we're talking out of respect for both people in a relationship, that nothing.
Nothing explicit should take place before the marital agreement is set. And what I mean by that is in order to maintain and save the honor of both people, so that no one has a heartbroken or hurt or, or kind of like destroyed in a certain emotional sense that all the ducks have to be in a row. Right? why this is the case is because Devin, have you ever met anyone who is used in a relationship, like either guy or girl, or cheated on or whatever, or you find out something about him after about her after the breakup. So this is meant to protect both people in a relationship against things like that. It's meant to maintain the modesty, the honor and the sanctity of
marriage. So in the Muslim tradition, you won't find a Muslim dating in the traditional sense of traditional Western culture sense of dating, which is, you know, basically, that it's up to the couple to decide their boundaries, the boundaries are set down by the divine scripture, and after marriage, then it becomes a very, very healthy relationship. So this brother is asking, right, clearly, someone knows mine.
So
I endorse your marriage.
So no, so he's asking what so a lot of people ask this question to actually a lot of people ask the question how much
know in Islam, we're taught that everything has an exception, that allowance, but it always has a balance, right? And so while we don't allow people moving in together before marriage, right, there is definitely a healthy way to know someone. So for example, let's just say on the, on the context of the college campus, you see someone that catches your eye or you're in a class with someone, or you, you know, work or your family, friends, whatever, they catch your eye, right? And as long as totally permissible to find out if there's mutual interest, right?
Right. But not in that way. Don't do that.
But you can you can reach out either through friends, if you find out if she thinks that I'm you know, cool too, or she seemed to be as well. You can go through friends or you can just straight up ask, I mean, the prophets first wife Khadija
passed away, she straight up sent a friend over to him, right, so there's a precedence in the Eastern culture for the male to make the first move. But in the life of the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him, his first marriage was initiated by a woman by her when she was like, Hey, I'm in you, you and to me, he was like, yeah.
So that that initial step of mutual kind of like, feeling out on the radar, like, are you into me? That's totally allowed in Islam and totally permissible again, culturally, you might run into roadblocks here, because this is not what Amina who did right. So you have to make sure that you kind of negotiate that, that that tension. Now beyond that, how do you get to know one another, we find that in Islam, a person or two people who are interested in one another are able to go out are able to socialize, go out to dinner, go to games like that, as long as they're not in a completely private setting. And Eric determined that they can't be completely private, right. And in Arabic, we
learned that tradition. In the Muslim tradition, the Prophet Muhammad was narrated as saying that when a man and a woman are alone, in that kind of atmosphere, that Satan is the third that shaitaan is the third. And what's meant by that is that the influences and the whispers of you know, evil deeds or impure things are often very magnified, magnified to begin to grow alone, right. So that is the way in which you initiate that process. A lot of it is dictated by personal comfort, though. So in Islam, there's always the baseline, this is what you can do, this is what you can't do. But then a lot of it after that is dictated by personal comfort. So for example, you might be comfortable
going out to dinner with this girl to get to know her, and that's totally fine with religion, but she may not be comfortable at that stage yet, you may have to take it slow things like that. It's kind of what I like to say is there's kind of a kind of a melting pot between the Western culture of dating, and the Muslim culture of modesty. It's kind of modest. Right? And I don't say this publicly, because I'm going to get like crucified by by elders in the community. But really, in order to understand American culture, that's really the best way to describe it.
And get it you know, what is right and what is wrong as as as a God, God conscious person, and you are always going to be, you know, accepting of that gentleman.
So you're saying, tell the parents first before you get another girlfriend?
Yeah, I think it's I think it's kind of traditional, positive, more that I travel and more
I grow up as a person. I'm only 24. Right now, the older I get.
You see that like, it's kind of changing, like the tide is shifting a little bit. So I think there might have been like negative connotation, but honestly like moving forward and Islamic legislation, like the legal code in Islam, but it's fine, totally fine, you know, and the parents Well, I personally from a practical perspective, was married, I would say that, you want to make sure that you check first with the girl or the girl next to the guy.
Before And generally speaking, you both know.
So make sure you check for our recommend mutual interest first.
And then once you both have decided that you are not into each other, then you can approach the family
shouldn't be walking all over, but
possibly.
We got a question. But I like what
I say y'all
can't shake it.
We met like
we met on the internet, but not in that way. But we didn't be like
I write a lot. On writer I read
poetry. I used to write a lot of like editorials and magazine articles. And she was ahead of her youth group in Memphis. And so she's also my writing she asked me to write for her.
Back when
a lot alive, apparently. And then we just got through that relationship and
my best friend.
Get home tonight.
Don't feel shy at all. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, for sure. Actually, there are. So the prophets lifestyle was polygamous. And again, this has a lot to do with the cultural context that we're in as well. In fact, in Islamic law, it is illegal to have one on one wipe in America, because it is the state law, the code, the code of the national law. Well, not national, but most of the states don't allow for it. And so this is something that culturally dictated even until today, there are many nations that have polygamous cultures, and you find this and so it's not something that was necessarily Islamic in essence, but it was something that Islam did adapt from the culture, Islam is kind of a beautiful thing, because it kind of takes
to the culture of where it is. There's a there's a maximum Islamic legal code in the books that are 100 years old, that saying that the culture of a place has a legal legislation. And what that means is that we should act according to the culture of where we live, right? And this is a religious religion. So how can you treat them all equally? Well, as many of you know, right? We're all different people, we all have different likes and dislikes. And so what the prophet Muhammad, do you find that you treat certain life a certain way, because that's what she would like him to survive, certainly,
in terms of spending time with him, he would just cycle through
who treat them well. Also, they were not forced to be in the marriages, they can easily dissolve, they wanted to, in fact, there was a point where I showed you that he didn't want me American anymore. And she said, No, I do want to marry. So it wasn't a tyrannical kind of like relationship. It was very, very mutual. They could leave or enter a marriage, they wanted to whenever he proposed marriage was forced on anyone. They chose whether or not they wanted to. And again, we have to understand that when you examine a culture, from the outside, in, a lot of things are going to look weird to you. But when you examine a culture from the inside in, and a lot of things make sense,
maybe you don't agree with them. For example, I don't agree with married as someone who was born and raised in America, as someone who studied with Islamic scholars. I know what is islamically legislated and what I feel with American youth, right? So I feel personally that I do not feel comfortable with it. Does that mean that I'm a sinner? No. Does that mean that I'm not Muslim enough? No, it just means that my culture has shaped me in a way which is going to dictate how I live, but that's why it's so general because it allows for you to feel comfortable with a variety of rules.
And said you would treat them well and everything was voluntary. It was not
There you go.
Okay.
Any other questions? Don't feel shy. You have about 10 more minutes? That's a great question. I don't mind the open room question
at all.
But there are folks that are not necessarily
people who don't necessarily
have to understand more about
what can I share with you? Okay, there's a, there's a narration that's
two words, here for me at the
end.
This is beautiful. Whenever anyone asks about Islam, this is the answer. The problem is said that this deal would be the way of life this faith is sincerity. And the companion astroeq sincerity that that's a very big statement prophet. He said sincerity with three things with your Creator with God, if you don't even say like the existential transcendental is power that governs All right?
And then with job profits, right, so sincerity in terms of their teachings, and following up in sincerity with your fellow creation on earth men and multiply everything in an object and being sincere with them, being sincere and being helpful and serving them Islamic basis based on this principle, that sincerity is the key to pleasing God has nothing to do with how big your beard is, or how big your job is, or how long you're gonna do that. That's those are part and parcel of the equation. But sincerity in the heart is the key. Islam focuses on purifying your heart and taking care of the impure and bad habits that human beings have, for example, backbiting, last
two major sins that humanity understands and agrees upon murder, that Islam's goal is to purify the heart from those things. Don't get caught up in the fact that Islam is a form of religion. It's not really a form of
Christianity originally was from where Jesus was not from Alabama. He got the English
Jews from Palestine, he was more like, I mean, there's Okay, so before I say this, I got arrested, which is I was eating lunch with a pastor in Knoxville.
And he said in front of everyone, I didn't say this. It was gay or listening. I would say that
in the middle of a restaurant in Knoxville, Tennessee. Okay, what's another redneck? Nashville's more threatening area? But not so he goes, he goes, Jesus.
Boy, right. He sounds like.
But the point he was trying to make was like that. We kind of see like Judaism and Christianity, these American religions, which is partially just because they've been
established in America, institutionally for more than maybe 50 years now. It's still a foreign faith, when in fact, if you study the tradition of faith itself, not as someone who wants to convert you listen, I think conversion. That's one thing as beautiful as long as it works out, we can't convert anyone. It's all to God. It's up to you and yourself. So like I can travel all I want, but I don't control your heart. You control your own heart. And so as God is let's kind of take the pressure off of humanity. No one's gonna try to like, you know, proselytize or like try to evangelize anyone. It's not it's not part of the Islamic faith. But if you study it for yourself,
just for humanistic purposes, you'll find that its goal is to purify the soul.
If you have any questions on
arm with the body parts bodypart dot m [email protected].
So, good question. Very question. So there's a verse in the problem which commands both men and women to lower their gaze. Again, you look at it, we can look at it in a literal sense. We've also looked at it both are both are correct. And it depends on the person themselves the grandest kind of custom thing. You buy a shirt from like Kohl's or like Macy's, or wherever you're shopping.
It doesn't fit you perfectly. Right sizes are within range. When you go to a shirt custom fit that's like you that fits you perfectly,
versus allow to be general fit or custom fit depending on how you want to be done. So this version says no, you're gay men who are gay for another and maintain a modesty. It can be a couple of things. First of all, lowering your gaze is a metaphor and Islamic signs of being a modest person and not looking directly at
Even up until recently, in pre postmodern time,
in America, it was disrespectful to look at some of the things, especially when they were high ranking. And so now we just kind of like New Age culture, where if you don't look at one of the different platforms, we have to look at it and adapt, remember at optimal hakima. So here's the point, your question, you can take it literally depending on your heart, if you know you're someone who has a real bad issue, staring at people in the muscle way, then take it literally, then lower your gaze, you should not look right. But if you know that you're someone who can look or we can dodge that, that info that inclination, your heart, pretty simple, then you can look at in a modest
way, right? And so it's kind of you have to take it, and you have to be honest with yourself. Part of being a successful faith practitioner and being honest with yourself, when people lie to themselves about their own state where they are, that's when the religion goes.
That's when it all kind of falls apart. Because you're like, this isn't.
When we can be honest with ourselves, then we start to see the relevance and the growth that we develop in our relationship.
Yeah.
Part of part of living in America is that we do live in a very hyper sexualized culture, that everyone thinks that everyone into them.
Right? I mean, everyone really believes that everyone likes them. Right? Like, I wouldn't go for a girl.
No, no.
So to answer this question, number one is that we have to, we have to get out of that, like, Don't look at other human beings as opportunities for human beings, especially in the Muslim community. But not every single girl is
like, like, respect yourself, or have some dignity, like, Don't look at every person with that I that's number one, I'm not saying you, I'm saying, in general, you're mentioning what the girl might look like, she's got real, right, and you and we only get rid of the second part of that is that we do you have to respect people's personal competence. If someone is used to a certain kind of interaction that we shouldn't force our belief on them. And that's not just within the religion that's outside of that that's part of being an Earthling, or being on this earth is to respect people's comfort zones, and not to enforce things on them. And they don't feel comfortable. And so
the first part, we got to get over ourselves. For the second part, we also respect other people and their selves.
Yes.
I don't know what what what specifics. I mean, so how would you go about it? How would you want? Okay?
The whole Islamic dating concept that we talked about modest dating, is notable in another contract week, let's call it a courting. I'll call that courtship.
How would I expect my kids Well,
I'm gonna be a very different parent, I hope, I hope to god him.
And then I'm gonna, I'm gonna try. And I try to teach my kids right and wrong very early, and then let them kind of live their life.
God willing. But I think that generally speaking, just just being very, very open and communicating, communicable about the parameters, a lot of where not just any, not just any
Muslim community. But in any relationship. Communication is kind of where the religion will break down. Communication is not clearly given or taken. And we're not sure where the walls are, where the parameters and rules are, that's when people transgress Brown,
or hurt. So as a parent, I think I would just communicate very openly, like, these are the things that are allowed in faith. And these are the things that are not allowed.
And then also give them some advice, like, yes, some things might be permissible in Islam, but if you do them, people will judge you, right? So we have this whole concept like, I don't care, I don't care. I don't care. Don't judge me. Only God is true. Only God can judge you realize you're a human being you're part of a greater social context. And that that may affect may or may not affect your future.
So I'll give them kind of like the right and the wrong and then some advice. And then
shepherd.
It depends. It depends a lot on like the kid themselves. Like, one thing about being a youth minister is that you realize that no two young people are the same. When I say youth minister, I like 14 year olds, like 45 years old, right? Because like,
no two people are the same at all. And so one of my one of my kids,
one of my future kids inshallah may need several
games I had.
One of my kids might be like, just very, very self regulating self governing, and understand his or her limits, and
it's important to get that out there.
Any last minute questions? Yes.
I was raised Muslim. My father converted. He's a Catholic.
Catholic.
Catholic, my mother is Egyptian. So we have corned beef.
Thank you all very much for inviting me. Coming back to Chicago is always a treat. I love coming here from Chicago like not maybe the city
that skyline Did you can leave Chicago, but that skyline will never matter where you go. It's a place that I fell in love with. And every time I see it, every time I land Chicago, my heart just like cringes
I dread leaving beautiful places. So I want to thank you all for the opportunity to come visit again. And I hope that I can join your presence in
your presence. Thank you so much.
On Thursday, we will be having a boy and girls
for
combat by graphics card, and I'll be sure to come to the discussion afterwards at 830