Abdullah al Andalusi – Is Islam relevant in 21 century?
AI: Summary ©
The history and culture of the Islamic world, including its use of war horses, the Sharia, and the importance of the Sharia, are discussed. The sharia is linked to graduation and graduation from oppression and the use of punishment and drugs. The success of the women's crime system and the women's crime system in the US is also highlighted. The shaping of society is emphasized, including following certain criteria for election success and protecting minorities from violence and climate change.
AI: Summary ©
So I'd like to find the masjid for hosting this event for inviting me. I like to finally i freeship Austin, for the gracious hospitality and overwhelming generosity, the elders and brothers and sisters today for attending and listening to this discussion. Now, the today's discussion is Islam in the 21st century? And does Islam have anything to say for the 21st century for the problems that we have today? Many people assume that Islam is backward, it's out dated, you can apply in the modern world. And they assume this because the argument is brought forth that Islam arose in the seventh century. And so therefore, is 1400 years out of date from the modern world.
And yet, and they say that instead of Islam, Muslims need democracy. And they say that democracy is a modern system. And democracy is a system for today's world, and today's reality. But what any historian could tell you is that democracy is 2500 years old, and the republican system which was followed by the Roman Republic, is similarly old, as well, which means that democracy and the republican system is older than Islam. So technically, Islam is more modern, or less the iteration brought by the Rasul Allah sauce. And of course, Islam has come from all the ages, all the all the nations, but the the iteration of Islam via the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is more
modern, and then democracy and republicanism. And yet we assume that democracy, republicanism is the most modern system for today. And this is very simple to observe. When you simply ask yourself, what has changed from 1400 years ago to now or 2500 years ago from now? Sure, technologies change. So tools that humans use change, it coaches could change language changes over time, traditions come and go. The symbols of writing change, different religious beliefs pop up, and different ideas arise. And of course, the different political governments, they change the king, some kings of the poles replaced by other kings or other different governments, and sometimes even climate changes, as
well. But these things don't change. Human Nature doesn't change. Humans still need to survive, still need to reproduce, still need to have social relationships still need to be motivated by a spirituality or something higher than themselves. Whether if you're a materialist, it might be the nation, or it might be something else. So humans still have intellects, and they still have five senses. These things don't change. If you were to take a baby from the 21st century, put into a time machine, send it back to the time of the Prophet Mohammed Salaam Salaam, be very lucky baby to meet them. So of course, we don't be envious. But if the Muslims at that time, opened this time machine
and saw the baby and raised it, it would be no different to anyone at that time. When it reaches adulthood, it would be it would say, speak the same language, the same customs, same traditions, and so on. And if we were to take a baby for 1400 years in the past, and bring that baby to the future, and raise it like anyone else, raise it in Mississauga, Canada, it would be just like every other Canadian here. So humans don't change. Humans have always needed to live in groups. They needed to have entertainment, to eat, to get rid of waste, to make tools use tools to communicate store knowledge. They've had walls, they have children, they use medicine, they look after they're sick,
and they have families, and of course, they die. These realities of humans have never changed. So then what makes the system outdated? Well, actually, nothing makes the system outdated. Because a system is just a organization, a set of organizing humans, that's it has nothing to do with technology. And it has nothing to do with the weather, or culture, or religion.
So humans don't change and Islam is a system. And as a system, it directs a set of relationships between things with a method for implementing these relationships. And it doesn't require any particular kind of tools to be available.
For example, there's a verse in the Quran that orders Muslims to strike fear into their opponents. So people who obviously fight against Muslims, and you should tell your steeds and prepare your weapons of war to strike fear into the hearts of the enemies. But the thing is that if we were to use war horses warhorses, today, it would probably strike humor into the hearts of the enemies. But what the verse carries it carries an Illa, which is a reasoning or the the objective behind it, and it says, to strike fear. So whatever weapons you can bring up, that are sufficient to do this to deter your opponents, you should do that, which would mean as a Muslim reading this first you could
say, okay, maybe not warhorses anymore, but it's but I could develop submarines, planes, tanks, what have you, but a state could could implement those things. So the vessel Quran tells you the reason for for these particular commands, and then this reason can be implemented in in new ways, in this in this day and age.
All right.
Okay, so upon.
Well, life is life isn't the game and there's no current, there's no comeback. So
play at once and play properly.
What about, what about fichte,
1400 years ago, or 2000 years ago, or 3000 years ago, all human societies had to deal with the problem of theft, how'd you deal with it? And they had different ideas of how to deal with it. But the problem of people committing crime and theft is still a problem today hasn't gone away, hasn't disappeared.
So then how do we
approach this? And the people say, well, in the modern world, for example, we approach first by locking people up into into prison, or shall I say, human cages, putting people into human cages and depriving them of their family? And this is a enlightened way to deal with theft.
So is it an enlightened way? Is it a way that well, I could argue that even during the Roman times prior to the Prophet, Mohammed, Sawsan, and they put people into jails as well. It's not a modern tactic, a modern solution. And does it work? Well, let's get into that.
Now, first, I want to talk about the Sharia.
What is the Sharia? Well, whenever I last one, I listened to his messengers, he has revealed a way of living because Islam is a way of life. And our purpose of life is to worship Allah spawn to Allah and to make every aspect of our life revolve around him.
So the Quran says, of mankind, remain conscious of your duty to your Lord who created you have a single soul, and I've liked nature create its mate, and from the pair of them created and spread many women and men, remain conscious of your duty. That your your you start out life not having in a way rights whereby God owes you something. No, you start out your life by having a obligation to others to Allah, Spano, Allah, and following that obligation. You have obligations towards your family, to your neighbors, to your brothers and sisters, to your fellow human beings. So the Sharia is about discharging your duties. You know, in the West is all about rights rights. Give me give me
give me. But if no one is giving, then how can you take? So duties come first, before rights? Because you go into a desert island with no human beings. And there's lions and tigers and bears on that desert island?
You talk to those, those lions, tigers and bears and persuade them of your human rights to life before they eat you? Will they care? Does the natural world care about your rights? No, it doesn't. It's only if other human beings are there, that you ask them to protect you. And that means that they have to have a duty first, to care about you and to protect you. So without duty, there is no rights. So we start off with duties.
We see that in the Quran. It says God is saying I must want Allah says we sent down our messengers with clear signs and set them down with the book and the balance so that men may conduct themselves with justice. So the the fourth con, the criteria, the balance, this is what has been sent down for Allah Subhan Allah for us to judge what is just and what is not just
if we don't have this and how can we measure if something is wrong, or is right? Because in the natural world, you don't see any wrong and right animals do what they whatever they are programmed to do. And it doesn't matter if you're weak. It doesn't matter if you are don't don't have enough if you can't get it
You can't survive, you will die, and no one there is no one going to come to save you and no one's gonna come to help you in most cases.
So as, as Muslims, we have a criteria we're different from animals and we have a, a basis for judging.
And we say that the base of the Sharia, as it says, In the Quran, God says, with regards to what the messenger will, will command Muslims, he says he will enjoined upon them, that which is right, and forbids them that which is wrong, he'll make lawful for them all the good things and prohibit for them all the bad things, and he will relieve them of their burden, and that they're the fetters or the shackles that they used to wear. The point about the Sharia is not to oppress Muslims or to oppress people. It's actually about liberation, liberation from the oppression of humans on all the humans, so that we have freedom to worship Allah Subhan Allah without being impinged. So for
example, we live in Western societies, which tell women how to look how to act, and most of it involves mutilating the part of their body, taking hot irons or wearing high heels, or
putting layers of makeup on their face. And they have to look like these pictures is on magazines, and on billboards. And on TV, most of these, these pictures have been airbrushed. So they're not actually even realistically human. And women feel the social pressure
to conform to these images. And then men that are being taught that these are the women you have to go for these women you have to aim for and that women are to be joined purely for the physical aspects and not to actually have a real deep connection with commitment to having a family with. So in this social environment, this peer pressure, because it hasn't been controlled or regulated, people feel depressed, unhappy, unhappy with themselves. And they feel pressured to do things and to look others in ways that don't make don't make them happy and shackle them, shackle their minds shackled their their natures. So the state doesn't have to force you to do something, in order for
you to be oppressed, or doesn't have to deny your rights. But rather, as a state, like an anarchy doesn't restrict the strong from oppressing the weak, the business marketers, those fashion moguls, who basically dictate what people should wear, and put pressure on people to have a certain image, or, in the case of the rich being taken from the poor by interest bank in which I'm my my esteemed colleague, Jeff will go into that in more detail. But without those restrictions, you see concentration of wealth to the point that 1% of the world's population 1% of the world's population, own 50% of the world's wealth, and 50% of the world's population, the lowest, the lowest for 50%. Or
as much only only 1% of the world's wealth. This is what happens when we are shackled to an anarchic system of humans oppressing humans, without the guidance, and the point of Islam is to liberate you from these types of oppression. And these are just two examples, I can go into others. So we see that the Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu wasallam, described the Sharia
when he said that the example of the person abiding by Allah's order and limits or restrictions, in comparison to those who violate them, is like the example of those persons who drew lots for their seat on a boat. So people were given their seats on the boat through a random process, some had the bottom deck. So some of them got seats in the upper part, and the others in the lower part when the latter needed water. So basically, when those on the bottom part of the water, they had to go up to bring the water, and that basically troubled the others. And so they said, Let us make a hole in our share of the ship, as saving those who are above us from troubling them. And if so, if the people in
the upper part, let those, let the others do what they had suggested, all the people in the ship would be destroyed. And if they prevented them, both parties would be safe. So there's people in the bottom who say, let's not depend on those on top, let's not travel them. Let's be independent. As individuals, let's get the water for ourselves, let's do what we want as individuals. And they made this whole for the for the boat, if those were the top, stop them, they'd be saved. If those in the boat just let it happen, they would all sink. And this is the philosophy you could say, of how the Sharia orders society.
And some of the examples that people tend to pick is they pick the example of the punishments that Islam orders and they say, these punishments are very severe or they say that these punishments are oppressive. Now Islam doesn't just
Just focus only on the punishments most of it is the more um, a lot about the interactions and family law and the rights of the wife and the rights of the husband and inheritance. And of course, the economic system, which is, you could say the biggest part of any legal system is the economic system, which will be covered by my esteemed colleague. So what I will discuss is really then specifically the punishment system, because there's a lot of misconceptions about that. So let's discuss, let's discuss the issue of theft. So people say that the problem with the Islamic punishment with theft is that it is barbaric. It is inhumane, it doesn't deal with the problem
effectively, or it goes. It is exaggerating in its in its punishment of these people. But let me give you an example of the kind of the kind of problems you see in Western society. And let's see if the Western society has produced this kind of produced justice. So firstly, in Islam, we know that you can't punish anyone who commits theft, if they are poor, and they stole to feed themselves, or their family. You can't punish the poor in Islam, in the West, anyone and everyone is punished, although if you're poor, the judge might show forgiveness and just mitigate your sentence, not give you the full sentence, maybe give you a limited sentence. But in Islam, if you still because you're
poor and you had no other way, you can't be punished. It's a shame it's an eye on the state. It's a shame on the on the stomach government for not providing for you.
And we can see that Calif Omar rather and he when there was a time of famine. in Medina, he suspended the application of punishment for those who committed theft. Because people were stealing food because they were hungry. This is the drachma of, of Islam, the wrath of the law. In the West, there is no mercy if you still because you're poor, there's no mercy at all.
And what about those who still for luxury, and this would be the situation those who still not because they have to, but because they wanted to seek it as a career. Well, let's look at the western system. Let's look at see how much success is produced. So in the US, people who are imprisoned for theft and many types of crimes, that within three years of being released, 67% of them will reoffend will go back into crime. And of those of those people who reoffend 52% are re re incarcerated in the UK, it's 50% more reflect reoffend within the first year of being released from prison, and 74% are convicted of another crime within at least nine years after being released from
prison. In fact, prison has become a place of a criminal University, you can go there and listen to best practice of how to commit better crimes in the future. Or the way to trust anyone in the prison as being able to get away with crime is a different question. But it's considered to be now a prisoner's University, and you're putting human beings into human zoos basically cages stuck together what the American system is even worse than many of the European prison systems where it's become a business to store the soul. In fact, America has the largest prison population in the world.
Now, you think, oh, that's 300 million people. Yeah, but compared to China, which is 1.1 billion people or India again, 1.1, or one 2 billion people.
And yet, America still has the highest population of prison population in the world.
So they encourage you to seek most people to seek getting wealth, and they encourage you to be greedy. And they say that the purpose of life is to maximize your wealth. And at the same time, they haven't addressed the economic problems, which are getting the shackle covered.
And that the cause of create a big poverty that a lot of people commit crime, and they don't care if they're poor, they'll put them into prison, where they will languish, and they'll have a black mark against their name. And in some cases, that this the free strike program where if you commit free crimes, you're in prison for life. And the only and the victim isn't just the person who commits the crime, it's also their family, their family will be deprived their husbands or their their brothers or their fathers,
or increasingly, their sisters and mothers being sent to a to a jail where these these human beings are in this cage, and they begin to do very horrific things to each other because they all crammed into this cage, like a battery farm, you know, like you see chickens being put into which is also wrong, by the way, but that's a different discussion.
So what what is Islam do? Well, this Samak method is support Allah. It's corporal, not punishing people by putting them into cages, but giving instant punishments that they can be sent back to their family the very, very same day sent back to their family the very same day. People argue, but why the sonic punishment perfect? Why does it do that? Is it to to mutilate? Is it just to be barbaric? said no. What do you still with? What do you use to steal?
Is anyone
your hands. So if people despite if taqwa Minh, Allah doesn't stop them from stealing, if a society which does not praise wealth as their purpose in life, if that doesn't stop them from stealing, if the fear of punishment doesn't stop them from stealing it, fear of the shame from society doesn't stop them from stealing, and they are not insane. They are saying people, then there, then they have chosen this as a career that they didn't have to choose because they would be provided for by the beta mod, the Treasury would provide for everyone who is poor,
and would then raise taxes if there's not enough money in order to feed everyone as poor. So if a person steals, they do it for luxury. And it's not just this, there's actually seven different criteria, seven different criteria has to be fulfilled. So much so that it's usually only B, you could say, cat burglars and dedicated career criminals who actually do it for the fun of it for the career for doing it as a career, you have to steal from a secure location. And it can't be from a member of family as a whole number of criteria that has to be fulfilled before the head is applied. Then if this person chooses to do this career, despite all these restrictions, then there was a
problem with that person. And therefore, in order to protect the economic system, and to protect people's right to property, you will limit their ability to steal, but put them back into society, put them right back with their family. And people will know and they'll they could be the state will cost them the rest of their lives. It's better that than putting them into a jail, which costs more money. It costs more money to do to put them into jail. And it's a barbaric that's more barbaric.
What about the punishment for murder? They say it's horrific to use capital punishment for murder.
Well, I'd argue that, Well, firstly, the United States doesn't believe that, of course. But I believe in Canada, I don't know if there is a you don't have death penalty anymore. You've abolished it like UK?
Well, here's the thing. If someone commits murder, if someone commits murder, then the punishment in Islam is the equal the lack of it, it's or you could say it's justice like for like the state wouldn't judge the case. If the evidence meets certainty, then the punishment is enacted. But a lot of way, is unfair on the murderer, to lock them up for the rest of their life into a cage where they're never going to come out, then what's that? What are they to live for? What would they be living for? What else is there to be living for? Even Western philosophers have realized this Western philosopher john Stuart Mill, he's a he's a secular liberal, but even he realized this, he
argued against the UK abolishing the death penalty. And he said that, what you by approaching it, you think what you're doing is more humane, but it ends up being more inhumane. If you think about what will happen to the mass murderer, because if the murderer is punished, then his suffering ends there and then is punished, the he doesn't suffer anymore. But if you consign this murderer to a life imprisonment, then their suffering will go on for years and years and years. Now, this is a secular liberal, he's a classical philosopher, john Stuart Mill. So even he recognizes this, even he recognized this, so no one can then criticize Islam for something that even they can recognize that
they think about it, that Islam actually has the more merciful option. As long as you make sure that the certainty that there's evidence is absolutely certain this person's commitment. And even then Islam does something that the western system don't even do. In Islam, the the family of the murdered Person of the victim can choose to forgive, can choose to forgive someone for murder. In the Western system, the judge cannot forgive you for murder. No one can forgive you for murder, with the possible exception of the President.
And it doesn't do often. Whereas in Islam, the victim's family can choose to forgive you and Gene said you pay Blood Money compensation.
So this is how Islam deals with these things. And I would say in a superior way. But also if you think about just in history, Islam was managing an area of land that took months to travel from one end to another from from a landless all the way up to a Hindu or Sindh province, and I've had to write a very long, very long list. It'll take months to travel the Hajj.
obligated on Muslims and they had to travel for months, sometimes for dangerous areas.
In this day and age, it's easier. It will take you less than 24 hours maximum maximum to get to Mecca. For most parts of the world, unless you're the exact other site that will take you about 24 hours depending on Legion get straight flights.
You can be and you'll be safe and secure in the plane communication between here and Mecca. You could you could literally email someone right now from this mosque and it would reach them within maximum a few seconds into Mecca communication. So considering that Khalif, oma and Ali and of Marlon and the other colleagues afterwards presided over a state that was from a landless all the way to India, and it took months just to travel and you have to use horses and camels and sailing ships. If they could do that back then, then how much more easier? Is it to apply the system now? With modern technology? It'd be even more easier.
What about Islamic government? People have said that Islamic government is is backward or it's not realistic. And I say well, how is it any How is it any less realistic than any other government that you have today? In fact, I would say it's more realistic and more practical. First and foremost, the the group of companions gave the allegiance to the Prophet Mohammed, Salah, Salah.
And they and the Rasul Allah requested, he said, Give allegiance to me that you will not associate anything in worship of Allah Spano. Allah, not still not commit Zina was a foreigner fornication, not kill your children. And then it continued, and not disobey me and what is right, whoever fulfills whoever monkey fulfills this, his reward will be with Allah, whoever commits any of these sins will be punished in this world, and this will be an expiation for him.
So that person is not going to be held accountable in the next life, if they get punished in this life. Whoever commits any of these sins, but Allah conceals it, then it will be for Allah to decide if he wills, He will forgive him. And if he wills, He will punish him.
So what you get is that some government isn't here to force you to become religious, even in your own homes, when you in private, that's your business. This is where the Menaka keen can be malefic and the person who is who wants to be more men can be a movement, but in public, the monastic should not be allowed to spread or promote or push his luck on the rest of society.
So in public, people cannot get committed no, you can't drink alcohol in public can't do any of these things. Because if because we know what it's like to be in a society whereby gambling is easy and casinos are available, and all kinds of
establishments of ill repute are on the streets. And of course, where people are walking on the streets, in with heavily sexualized clothing men and women, not just women, men and women. We know what it feels like to be in a society where this is encouraged and even praised, where people have to judge each other by what we look like and not at what's the content in our hearts and our character. And this is the problem that even many in the West have talked about this at the over sexualized and sexualization of women. And they talked about the
how the exploitation of women in this regard and nursing careers increasingly men. So the point of Islamic system is not to force Muslims to do all the winter more or the nephila of the salah and all this stuff, no, no, and not even to tell Muslims which madhab you have to follow or which school of Akita you have to follow. Because we know the famous story of Mr. Malik was quoted to the help of his time, leaf said, your your motto is GitHub and water. It was a collection of different obviously some of the legal pins of Lima Malik he said, I will make this the standard book that everyone must must learn from a must adopt. And in my mind, I said no, he does not want this does not want this at
all.
So if the Islamic State is not to compel this, an Islamic government is to protect Muslims and give them an environment that will allow them to to worship Allah spawn Allah without the kind of pressures that push them away from Allah spawn to Allah without the social pressures, and the economic pressures which my esteemed colleague the ship will cover. And lastly, the Islamic government would be more conducive to justice, because in Islam, the obligation is that we elect a halifa and the method is via shorter now the shorter or consultation can adapt to any society. So if it's in Afghanistan, the society might be more tribalistic and some of the areas you can use the
Loya Jirga, which is a gathering of tribal chiefs.
They can do that. Or maybe in in capoeira in Egypt, if it's more urbanized, you can have direct elections by the people if they want to do that. Or they can elect people to form an electoral council who then themselves with intellect or halifa. But the shorter idea is always going to be the universal constant. But it can adapt depending on the circumstance, because we know that the election of abubaker was different than election armor, and different from election of man and different the election of Alli. But it all required shorter. But it depended on what was the circumstances to provide that shorter at their time.
So as long as adaptable without needing to change anything of itself. Actually, I don't even want to use the word adaptable. Islam doesn't adapt Islam guides in all circumstances. That means you change to survive, but Islam guides in order to direct what the environment should be not to adapt to survive in the environment, but to guide as to how you should change the environment in there and get in the right way to achieve that the goal of worshipping Allah spawn Thailand, establishing his welcome fill in on the earth.
But not only this, in an Islamic government or stomach regime, the people cannot put themselves up to be candidates for halifa, or for the leader. Because as we know, that also love Solomon said, we do not give power to those who asked for it. So these people will have to be recommended.
And not only this, but once someone is elected, and they have to go through a criteria of whether they are adult, whether it's whether they are just rather, whether they are mature and sane and competent, because someone could be just that incompetent. So whether they are competent. I wish the American elections had had that list of criteria, we wouldn't be seeing the current president as he is now the United States, probably a few other presidents in the past would probably be eliminated even before the election begins. We're not on the candidate, the candidate list. So all these candidates have to first pass these criteria. And then the people can decide which one do they want
to to follow and have competence in AI once the halifa is in power. The belief doesn't have to invent policies or lie or pretend, in order to stay in power every four years, the leaders have to lie or they do token gestures, or they try to appease a minority or a majority. And some of these majorities might be have prejudice, or hatred, like you're seeing in the United States now, certainly against African Americans and against Muslims. A Khalifa can act purely on his conscience purely on the conscience, directed by the Sharia, because he doesn't have to worry about getting reelected or lying to get reelected or pretending to be anything. In fact, because the Muslims
believe that love is an obligation, they will not challenge the police's position, so they can criticize, if he's not doing anything, in the best way, give a good quiz, not insulting but good criticism, constructive criticism, and the police will not be insulted by it. Because in the Muslim world, currently, or in many other countries, which are dictators. The reason why dictators don't like to be criticized, is because in their country, in these countries where there is no map, there are no principle that governs the society. It's all purely reputation is reputation of the person. So if you criticize someone saying this person's not doing good policy, they feel that you're
criticizing the reputation, and it makes their position shaky. That's what they have to punish people for criticizing them. But why doesn't Trudeau arrest people for criticizing him? For an even insulting him? Why? Because he knows that in this country, everyone respects the system.
So in the Muslim world, if we had philosopher which Muslims would believe is a fact and we have to obey, then the holy didn't have to worry about people kicking him out of power, if they didn't, might not like some of his policies, because he knows that the Muslim will respect the system and our position, even if they don't like the guy himself.
But there are also some, there are better advantages. In the West, the leaders don't have to follow
your desires at all whatsoever. In fact, they only want your vote, not your opinion. But we see that throughout Islamic history, the halifa has always been conducting shootout with the people what is their needs, because we know from we know from a narration it was it was towards mob that was narrated to Mario that Allah so he who does not fulfill the needs of people, Allah will not fulfill his needs. And so why we appointed a person specifically to investigate what the people want needs needed for their themselves. And there was so much shorter that the Europeans were shopping Europeans at the time of insult we're talking in the time of 1786 the French ambassador to Istanbul
can't shuffle goofier he was shocked at how the Muslims lived because in
France, the Kings commands. That's it. That's that's all they care about. But he wrote back to the kidlit, the king, the king in France, that Louie the 16th. And he said, Here, things are not as they are in France, where the king is the sole Master, and does as he pleases. Here, the small town has to consult, and he has to consult with the former holders of high offices, with the leaders of various groups and so on. And this is a slow process, he was complaining, saying, Oh, it's so slow. Why don't we just do it like in France, where you quit the king's commands? And that's it? No, who cares? But before the Sultan does anything, he has to ask the people what they want? And what is
affect them? And how does it affect them?
And not only this, but we see that in Islamic government, minorities are better protected than you see in democracies. And the reason being is because and I'll finish on this, because in a democracy, you're right, the principle generally is the majority rules. And the majority often takes away the rights of the minority.
Whereas in Islamic government, the act of Dima, they have a contract with the with the Muslims. And his contract is that as long as they abide in peace, and whatever was agreed in that contract, when they have negotiations,
then they will be protected. There'll be protected by the by the Muslims. And we see to the point that they will give them their own law courts. So the Jews have Jewish law courts, Christians had Christian law courts, if they want to come to the Sharia court, then, of course, they're going to judge by the Sharia. And they often did, because they thought they'd get better justice. But they could go to the old law courts that even had their own police forces in semi autonomous regions. That's why in the Middle East, you'll see many towns only Christians. And before in the past, before Israel, there was many Jewish only areas, Jewish cities and so on because they were free to they
form their communities and they were not touched or molested or or prosecuted in any way. In fact, a Jewish historian a 19th century Jewish historian Heinrich Gratz Express expressed, it was a nice favorable circumstances that the Spanish Jews came under the role of the mohammedans, meaning the Muslims, as whose allies they esteemed themselves, the equals of their co religionists in Babylonia and Persia, they were kindly treated, obtained, religious liberty of which they had so long been deprived, were permitted to exercise jurisdiction over their co religionists. And we're only obliged, like the conquered Christians to pay a citizenship tax. And we see that the Prophet
Mohammed Salaam Salaam said, Whoever has harmed in me, has harmed me.
And as Muslims,
we love we're taught to love more than our own parents, more than our mothers and fathers. And we wouldn't want to see a single hair on the head of the of the salon, some being touched in any way or violated any way, needed, even insulted. We can't tolerate it. And yet the Prophet Mohammed Salaam Salaam said that whoever harms the name of the person to Alabama, is equal, especially as equal as if you have harmed him.
So I say Which country do you think you'd like to live in? And where you think you're right to be best protecting our country, where the people this country believe that it's their religious duty, that is equal to honoring their profit for them to protect you, or a country where your rights are only given to you as long as it's convenient for the national interests? Which country do you think is going to be safer for you?
And therefore, I say province sisters, that the Islamic system, it brought justice for 1400 years. And the only reason it collapsed and fell down was because Muslims, we are fortunate because we became very successful, especially during the 16th century, we relaxed, we got complacent. And we we enjoyed lots of wealth and lots of security. And we forgot what we were here to do. We forgot the Islamic world project to spread justice to the world. suppiler when I hear the oppression of the native Aboriginal rights, and the histories of Native American Indians, and Aboriginal Australia and others, and of South America, because Muslims weren't there to protect, to protect them, I feel
ashamed. That's a shame on us. Because we should have been protecting them. There's a quote the verse in the Quran says, What is wrong view that you do not find the cause of Allah for those weak and oppressed amongst men, women and children who call out Oh God sent from us sent from you, someone who will protect us.
So this is what we forgot. And pretty soon the West they, they learn about technology, they learned our science, they as soon as they became technologically superior to us, they took all lands and then they tried to force us to
except their system, and they tried to force us to dismantle the Islamic system, because the Islamic system is the only obstacle to them, committing the injustice of extracting resources at dirt cheap prices, and forcing their products and other people around the world and creating almost slave market systems to their economic systems. They call it the international system. And it's neocolonialism or some people call it this is a system that we have to challenge and that we have a system that can solve the world's problems in a more humane and more merciful, merciful way. And the more justly and not just for Muslims, but also for non Muslims. So ask your brothers and sisters,
research this system research what Islam has the solutions it has to these problems and inshallah, we should not be thinking just about solving the problems in the Muslim world, we should get to the point where we should be thinking how many of the problems for the non Muslims in the world climate change and poverty in South America and parts of Africa, we should be at the forefront of thinking about how we can solve their problems, not just our own problem. That's where we should be as the summit board project as our purpose and as the project
bequeathed to us that we inherited from him. It's time to continue his project provinces according