Abdur Raheem Green – Islam And Democracy
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Channel: Abdurraheem Green
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AI Generated Summary ©
The speakers stress the importance of Islam, its implications for modernization of religion, peace, and avoiding false accusations, and the need for everyone to be aware of its truth. They also touch on its history, including its rise in popularity due to its impact on the world and its use of nuclear weapons. The "immature" label is a reflection of actions and past experiences, rather than a reflection of history.AI Generated Transcript ©
hamdulillah Nemo in a state of hoonah Sofitel when our Villa Himanshu de and fusina woman say at Yama Lena
de la who follow modela were my youth little follow her the Allah worship one, either in the law, WA shadow Mohammedan, Abu rasuluh, that
federal law while hiral had the had the Mohammedan sallallahu alayhi wa sallam was Sharon Marie must refer to her wakulla monitor is in beta wakulla, Middleton de la la,
boca de la Latin for now. We begin by praising Allah, we praise Him we seek His help and we ask for his forgiveness. We seek refuge with ALLAH, from the evil of ourselves, and from the evil consequence of our evil actions.
Whomsoever Allah guides, there is none to misguide.
And whomsoever Allah leaves to go astray, there is none to guide. And I testify that Allah alone is worthy of worship, and that Mohammed sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is His Messenger. After that,
the best speech is the book of Allah. And the best guidance is the guidance of Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and the worst of all the affairs of those matters, that has been newly introduced into the religion of Islam. And every matter that is newly introduced into the religion is a bit of iron ore and innovation, and all of these religious innovations. They are by their very nature, a going astray from the straight path that has been shown to us by Muhammad Sallallahu, Alayhi, wasallam. And whatever deviates and goes astray, from the straight path of Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam, is eventually going to lead to the hellfire.
The topic, Islam and democracy
is, without doubt, in this day and age, a topic that is inevitably going to be controversial.
But
there is a clue already and what I have just said
that it doesn't need to be a controversial topic, at least certainly for Muslims.
Because if we were to transpose ourselves to another time in another era, then the topic would not be one of concern.
The concept of democracy
did not even exist, except in history, where a small states in Greece practiced a form of governance, which was known by the philosophers of the time as democracy.
And it is very interesting to note
that a number of Greek philosophers themselves considered democracy to be a underfitting, and weak and corrupt form of governance. In fact, one of the great Greek philosophers said
that one of the major problems with democracy, as it was practiced then by the Greeks
was that the leader would always have to pamper
to the desires and the whims of the people in order to gain their support.
And thus, a leader would not be able to take the firm, decisive and conclusive decisions, and a leader would not be able to take the morally sound decisions that a leader should
because by doing so, he would have to contradict the opinion of the masses, he would lose their supports, and therefore would not be able to continue his position as a leader. Even then,
those many many hundreds of years ago.
The Greek philosophers had already expounded and discussed some of the weaknesses and the deficiencies of the
system.
And it is only relatively in recent relatively recent history, that this idea of democracy
has been reinvented and reintroduced, and has been spread mostly by first of all Britain.
Or perhaps To be fair, perhaps, first of all France.
And then Britain and America, this concept of democracy as the ideal form of human governance, the ideal way through which and by which human beings should govern their affairs, now, really to go into the historical and philosophical
context, and causes of development of democracy is beyond the scope of our lecture today. And even if we had time, I myself personally do not have the resources at hand to be able to deliver such a lecture.
And also I question
the benefits of going too deeply into such issues. Now, I know that there are many voices in the world today
that are leveling their criticism towards Islam, and Islamic what they call Islamic fundamentalism,
or the Islamist voice
and reflecting the Nawab, very precious statements,
and reminder and call for unity amongst Muslims. I would first of all like to add to that, be aware of allowing ourselves and allowing the agenda to be set by the non Muslims for us. I remember after
the events of September the 11th.
And the imminent invasion of Afghanistan, I did a huge number of lecture tours in the United Kingdom.
And the theme of my lecture was the Taliban and Afghanistan and Islamic fundamentalism. And there was a huge response from the non Muslims, I saw numbers of non Muslims in my talks that I had never seen before.
But one of the messages that I wanted to convey to the Muslims, as I found many Muslims would stand up in the question and answer session, and they would speak very strongly against the Muslim fundamentalist these fundamentalists, this and these fundamentalists that
am I advise those people, as I advise you now,
do not let the media and the agenda
of those people who do not believe in our religion, and who are not part of this precious of Mohammed sallallahu, alayhi wasallam, do not let them divide us further. They want to divide us into fundamentalists and moderates, and modernists, and the more different groups they can divide us in. And the more they can have us fighting amongst each other and refuting each other, the more happy they will be. Therefore, I don't even like this term, fundamentalist Muslim, Islam is Muslim, every Muslim must be a fundamentalist in the literal sense of the world. Because we all
because we all believe fundamentally in Islam, we all believe the Quran is the word of Allah subhanho wa Taala. We all believe that the Quran has remained unchanged and will remain unchanged until Allah subhanaw taala lifts up the Quran from this earth. We all believe that Allah has sent with the Quran, a messenger, whose words were true words, whose example was the best example, whose life was a practical explanation of the end. And this practical explanation exists with us today. And we call it under the generic term, the Sunnah of the messenger sallallahu alayhi wa sallam
We all believe in the Quran. And we all believe in the Sunnah of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and whoever disbelieves in one verse of the Quran, or whoever comes to know of one Hadith of the Prophet, and they know that this is authentic, and they disbelieve in it. They have disbelieved in the whole religion.
This is what every Muslim believes. This is the fundamental of our Deen
salata, tan ha, Anil Pasha Eva Monica. The Salah is the most important pillar of Islam after a man after faith, indeed successful other believers
who pray with humility and attentiveness you have no excuse for missing your Salah grandstand pray by setting if you can't say pray while lying on your side. You can even pray with Shara with just indication. But offering Salah is compulsory there is no excuse for you to miss your Salah, Salah the programming towards righteousness.
Dr. Zakir Naik speaks on Salah the programming wants righteousness in truth exposed. The only religion acceptable in the sight of Almighty God is the religion of peace. Islam is a religion of peace, Islam and Quran talks that force can be used as a last resort only let peace prevail. Peace. Our vision of Islam is not meant only for the Muslims or the Arabs. It is meant for the whole of humanity.
Dr. Zakat speaks on peace vision of Islam in truth exposed sequel to the interfaith dialogue. This book was printed in an emergency that something in a hurry can be writing a book,
black and white proof. If a person doesn't know
what is the common wisdom Hinduism, you should not attempt to miss codes and misconceptions.
idol worshipers are 1000s of years people have been doing worship in our country. Did I criticize idol worship? It is a Hindu scriptures who criticized and I'm quoting the Scripture.
This sequel is mainly to remove the other misconceptions that people may be influenced
to the interfaith dialogue between Dr. Zakir Naik and Shri Shri rubbish Shankar on concept of garden Hinduism and Islam in the light of sacred scriptures in crossfire.
And having introduced this topic of the fundamentals of our de Vaca en
the Sunnah of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and by extension, also the people who understood this religion the best were the people who lived with and listened to, and were taught by the prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam.
His companions, the companions of the Prophet were the living students of Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam. When the Prophet prayed, they saw him praying.
They saw the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, when he was sitting on his camel and the revelation came upon the Prophet, and it was heavy, so the Prophet would begin to sweat and even the camel on which the Prophet SAT, began to sag and had to sit down from the weight of the revelation. His companions saw that they lived with the messenger sallallahu alayhi wasallam.
Therefore, it is only logical and rational, and this is confirmed by the court and
it is confirmed by the verses of the Quran
that their understanding is the best understanding Allah Subhana Allah to Allah He mentioned in his book, The meaning of which is whoever contends with the messenger and chooses a path other than the path of the believers, then Allah will leave them in the path they have chosen, and land them in hell. What an evil refuge.
And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said,
when he gave a hot bath, he gave a sermon. And the companions began, their hearts were moved, and they began to pray.
Cry,
and they began to feel as if this the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam was saying goodbye to them as if it was a fair well sermon. So one of them stood up and said, O Messenger of Allah, it seems to us as if this is a farewell sermon, so advise us, they were waiting, hoping for some precious piece of advice from the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, that if he was to leave them at that moment, there will be something they could hang on to. And so these are the words of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam.
He said, I advise you to fear Allah.
I advise you to fear Allah
and to hear and obey your Amir even if he is an Abyssinian slave.
He said after me, you will see great differing, you will see great, excellent, great deferring. The Prophet is telling his companions that after I have gone you will see people deferring to a great extent. So he said, cling to my Sunnah. And the Sunnah of the whole of Russia do the rightly guided successes, and bite it with your molar teeth, bite it. And beware of the newly invented matters in the religion. This was the advice of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, he didn't just say cling to my son, but he also mentioned the Sunnah of the whole of Russia in the rightly guided successes, which means of course, first and foremost, Abu Bakr, Siddiq,
and then Omar,
and Othman, even a fan, and Ali Eben taalib. These first and foremost are the hood of Russia de
and of course, the house of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam,
which includes his wife, Ayesha, and Fatima, and whoever else the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam included as his house. And then the righteous companions and the people of knowledge. People like Abdullah, even others, Abdullah bin Massoud, Abu huraira.
And many, many other other companions. These are the ones the Prophet told us to hang on to their example, when we see differing,
we must always refer it back to Allah and His Messenger, not our whims, not our opinions, not our desires, not our intellects. But before anything we refer, always when we have a disagreement about anything, we must refer it back to Allah and His messenger.
So the very essence of Islam, the very essence of what Islam means is this lamb, to submit, to surrender to the will of Allah, obedience to Allah and His commands. This is the very essence of what Islam means. That is why the saying of the believers is always submit on the water honor, we hear,
and we obey, we hear and we obey.
So this is Islam, submission to Allah, to the commands of Allah, and the commands of Allah are contained in his Sharia,
the laws, the commands, and the prohibitions that Allah has given us, whether they are the commands to pray, and how to pray, to give charity, and how to give charity,
too fast, and how to fast to make pilgrimage and how to make pilgrimage. All the beliefs that we should hold about Allah and the angels and the messengers and the books and the Divine Decree and the life after death.
Oh, the laws by which we should live, what is halal, and what is haram? This is the Sharia. This is the laws of Allah subhanaw taala the laws concerning divorce, the family laws, and the criminal laws and international law. All of this is contained within the Sharia.
So at the very heart and the very essence of what Islam teaches us is that we are people who submit ourselves to the law of Allah, to the law of Allah.
And this is what is
means to be a Muslim.
By our very essence of what Islam teaches us, that if ever
the Muslim is faced
with a situation
where Allah has commanded us with something
and a human being commands us with something which opposes the command of Allah, the Muslim is the one who must always choose to obey Allah.
It's the very essence of what it means to be Muslim, to submit to Allah, we submit to Allah first, we submit to Allah before we submit to our parents, our teachers, our wives, our children, our desires, our rulers, whoever it may be.
being Muslim means that Allah comes first. And if in our hearts when in our minds, we put anyone equal with Allah, this is shirk.
This is the unforgivable sin. This is the sin about which Allah mentioned that he will forgive any sin that he wishes, but he will never forgive, that we should ascribe rivals and partners and equals to him.
that whoever makes should quit Allah, whoever makes rivals and partners and equals with Allah, whoever puts anything in this universe, on the same level with Allah,
then surely the Paradise is forbidden for them. And the fire of hell will be their eternal abode. This is what the Quran tells us.
Allah subhanaw taala mentioned
a very important verse for all of us that we must take extreme notice of this.
Allah mentioned about some people who came before us and they still exist today.
The Jews and the Christians have taken their priests and the rabbis, as Gods decides Allah.
And there was one Sahaba, who used to be a Christian. He said, O Messenger of Allah. We didn't use to worship them.
He used to be a Christian. And he was thinking that we didn't use the prostrate before them. We didn't use to supplicate to them and pray to them and worship them. But the prophet then clarified the meaning of this ayah
and the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, didn't they make halaal for you? What Allah made haram and you accepted it?
And didn't they make haram for you? What Allah made halal, and you accepted it?
Again, didn't they make lawful for you the things that Allah made unlawful? And didn't they make unlawful for you the things that Allah made lawful? He said, Yes.
We used to do that. And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, that was your worship of them.
That was your worship of them.
Therefore, surely, without doubt, whoever accepts any human being to be a legislator along with Allah subhanho wa Taala
and accepts that they have the right to legislate
along with Allah subhanaw taala than they have taken them as a partner with Allah. Whoever believes that any Imam, any Mufti, any molana, any share, or any human being has the right to make Haram. What's Allah made? halaal automake halaal was Allah made haram? They have done exactly what the Jews and Christians did. You have taken them as a God and you made them equal with Allah and you worship them as an idol along with Allah.
And I say to you, my brothers and sisters, what Abu hanifa said to his followers, and what Imam Shafi said to his followers, and what Mr. Malik said to his students, and what I've been humbled said to his students,
all of these great Imams, they said, Do not blindly follow me.
Take from where I took the book and the sun. If you find that Allah and His Messenger, if you find a hadith or an ayah, that contradicts what I say, leave what I say and follow the teachings of Allah.
Islam gift to the concept of justice, the protection of human rights that Allah, Allah does not consider us by the color of our skin, or our social status or any of that rather, Allah judges us according to our deeds, and according to our actions, that is justice, that no one is worthy of worship. And the angels main witness, and those who possess knowledge, they then witness that a law stands firmly for justice. When you pay Yamaha is credited. If you don't pay, your relationship is considered as Xena.
You cannot take away their rights until they allow you to do so. Islam is a beautiful tissue found the basic human rights I prefer.
I prefer every
pray for
and this is what it means to be a Muslim.
By our very essence of what Islam teaches us, that if ever
the Muslim is faced
with a situation
where Allah has commanded us with something
and a human being commands us with something which opposes the command of Allah. The Muslim is the one who must always choose to obey Allah.
It's the very essence of what it means to be Muslim, to submit to Allah, we submit to Allah first, we submit to Allah before we submit to our parents, our teachers, our wives, our children, our desires, our rulers, whoever it may be.
being Muslim means that Allah comes first. And if in our hearts and in our minds, we put anyone equal with Allah, this is shirke.
This is the unforgivable sin. This is the sin about which Allah mentioned that he will forgive any sin that he wishes, but he will never forgive, that we should ascribe rivals and partners and equals to him.
that whoever makes sure with Allah, whoever makes rivals and partners and equals with Allah, whoever puts anything in this universe, on the same level with Allah,
then surely the Paradise is forbidden for them. And the fire of hell will be their eternal abode. This is what the Quran tells us.
Allah subhanaw taala mentioned
a very important verse for all of us that we must take extreme notice of this.
Allah mentioned about some people who came before us, and they still exist today.
The Jews and the Christians have taken their priests and the rabbis as Gods besides Allah.
And there was one Sahaba, who used to be a Christian.
He said, O Messenger of Allah. We didn't use to worship them.
He used to be a Christian. And he was thinking that we didn't use to prostrate before them. We didn't use to supplicate to them and pray to them and worship them. But the prophet then clarified the meaning of this ayah
and the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, didn't they make halaal for you? What Allah made haram and you accepted it?
And didn't they make her wrong for you what Allah made Helen and you accepted it?
Again, didn't they make lawful for you the things that Allah made unlawful? And didn't they make unlawful for you the things that Allah made Lofa? He said, Yes.
We used to do that. And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said that was
Your Worship of them.
That was your worship of them.
Therefore, surely, without doubt, whoever accepts any human being to be a legislator along with Allah subhanho wa Taala
and accepts that they have the right to legislate
along with Allah subhanaw taala them they have taken them as a partner with Allah. Whoever believes that any Imam, any Mufti, any Maulana, any chef, or any human being has the right to make Haram. What's Allah made? halaal automake halaal was Allah made haram? They have done exactly what the Jews and Christians did. You have taken them as a God and you made them equal with Allah and you worship them as an idol along with Allah.
And I say to you, my brothers and sisters, what Abu hanifa said to his followers, and what mm Shafi said to his followers, and what Mr. Malik said to his students, and what even humble said to his students,
all of these great Imams, they said, Do not blindly follow me take from where I took the book and the Sunnah, if you find that Allah and His Messenger, if you find a hadith or an ayah, that contradicts what I say, leave what I say and follow the teachings of Allah.
Do not put anyone up on a pedestal, where you think that their words are beyond question.
Or their statements are beyond thinking and understanding. Does this correspond with what Allah said and His messenger said, I am a human being in the Malik Imam Abu hanifa Imam Shafi in an amicable humble, they were human beings. We all make mistakes, we forget we make errors, we our tongues slip.
So everything we always refer it back to a lion is messenger. Always. I don't mean by the way, that just you can pick up the Quran and pick up the Hadith and now start making fatwa? No, we still always need the scholars and we must always look to what the scholars have said, we are not scholars, I am not a scholar, not a scholar like Abu hanifa or Shafi or Malik, No, I am not a Mufti able to make this jihad. But we can look to what the orlimar have said.
And we can compare it with Allah and His messenger said and what other allamah have said.
Brothers and sisters, think about this. Think about this is the Bible that we have today. The Torah that Allah gave to Musa and the Injeel that Allah gave to Isa and the support that Allah gave to download. Is this Bible the same as those Yes or no? No. hamdulillah hamdulillah.
So is it not true, that the those books have been altered, and corrupted and changed? And some things have been taken out? And some other things have been put in? Is this not the truth concerning this book? Yes. Now, believe me, if anyone had an excuse to blindly follow the Imams, and blindly follow their rabbis, and blindly follow their priests, it would be the Jew in the Christian. They say, look, our work has been changed and corrupted. We, how can we understand even a book that has been corrupted? So we will follow our rabbis and our priests because our book is not even reliable. Now, if anyone had an excuse, they would have an excuse but then Allah may give them an excuse, no.
Allah said they took their priests and rabbis as God's besides Allah. As the Prophet explained, they made halau Allah made Haram.
We have a book that Allah has preserved from all corruption. We have the sooner the authenticated Hadith of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, what excuse therefore do we have when our book is preserved?
Subhan Allah.
Then how about the case of democracy?
How about the case of democracy?
Of course, the controversial issue is this. What is democracy?
what actually is
democracy?
That's a good question. You see, no one is actually really ready to define democracy. All they will tell us is democracy is good. Democracy is right. What is democracy? Well, there's lots of different versions of democracy.
They don't really want to define it. Because they know that every definition they give, does not actually realistically describe the system of government that they call democracy that they are practicing.
Abraham Lincoln described democracy as the government of the people, for the people, by the people. This is one famous definition of democracy. In fact, the actual word democracy itself means in the original Greek rule of the people, that's what it means.
If we take the concept of democracy in its absolutely pure sense, its literal meaning the rule of the people for the people by the people.
And that's all we're doing right now. We don't pretend to get any more sophisticated. Let's just take that meaning and examine that meaning because at least that's one we can start with.
Then Is this something compatible with Islam?
The media is playing games. 50 year old Muslim Arab, made a 16 year old girl. But when a 50 year old non Muslim rapes a 60 year old girl, it comes in news briefs. Today, the fastest growing religion in the world is Islam, the fastest growing religion in America as Islam, the fastest growing religion in Europe, watch doctors soccer night before the Americans came to Iraq, there was no suicide bombing after the American escape, then suicide bombing.
That one day nuclear weaponry, will fall in the hands of the Arabs, they fail to realize that the Islamic bomb has already been dropped. It felt that the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him upon Islam is designed to supersede all this religion of peace. This religion of this supersedes all the domains of life and enough media and Islam, war or peace. Why? Why so invisible to us? We have been gifted with a treasure, the Glorious Quran.
But we live in our darkness of ignorance, and suffer struggle, strife, understanding what Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him and said, how his companions lived, will lead us to the path of peace. And like, wherever we are anywhere in the world, our problems are the same, and so is the solution. We have different forms. But the spirit is one, let us invoke the spirit within the spirit of Islam.
Living the faith, watch out her heart and others in the spirit of Islam tonight at 6pm, UK and 7pm Europe on peace TV.
We don't have records that 911 was done by Muslims.
hypothesis.
Muslims are being targeted. They're called as terrorists directly.
For the World Bank for the power for the money 1000s of innocent people have been killed in Afghanistan. In Iraq, more people are being robbed, more people are being raped. The main purpose is that it's an open secret that Buddhists terrorists, terrorists, terrorists, Jewish terrorists, gf Christian terrorists, there isn't. It's not a monopoly of any religion. It is not.
If we take the concept of democracy in its absolutely pure sense. Its literal meaning the rule of the people for the people by the people.
And that's all we're doing right now. We don't pretend to get any more sophisticated. Let's just take that meaning and examine that meaning because at least that's one we can start with.
Then Is this something compatible with Islam? Is it I just told you what Islam is in its essence? Islam is submission to Allah.
Islam means obeying allows Sharia
Islam means obeying Allah's law. Islam means that what is Hillel has been decided by Allah and what is haram has been decided by alarm. What Allah decides is halal
was halal in the time of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is halaal today, and we will be halaal until the day of judgment. And what Allah made Haram in the time of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is haraam today, and it's going to be haram until the day of judgments.
We rule ourselves in our personal lives, and we should as Muslims be ruled in our public lives by the law of Allah.
Therefore, one of the names of Allah is a Sheree the lawmaker, and he is Al Hakim, the wise and I'll hack him the judge so that when we judge, we should judge according to what Allah has revealed. And as Allah mentions in the Quran, and those who do not judge by what Allah has revealed, they are the disbelievers. And those people who do not judge by what Allah has revealed. They are the wrongdoers, and those who do not judge by what Allah has revealed. They are the evil doers and the oppressors.
So therefore, how can
the law and the sovereignty being with Allah be compatible with the law and the sovereignty being with the people?
Since at its very fundamental level, democracy teaches that the people have the right to decide what is halal and what is.
The people have the right to decide what we should do and what we shouldn't do.
Therefore, the people have been made equal with Allah.
And whoever makes people equal with Allah has made shirk with Allah without a doubts and whoever believes that human beings have the right to legislate in contradiction to what Allah has legislated, is without doubt a disbeliever. Whoever believes that the legislation of the people is superior to us legislation is without doubt, a disbeliever.
Whoever believes that it is permissible and allows to judge and to legislate in contradiction with Allah's judgment and legislation is without doubt, a disbeliever.
However, if some Muslim
out of weakness
out of a deficiency in their Eman or due to their particular situation, in a particular environment,
is forced to do something or from their desires, and their weakness does something or implement something in their life which contradicts Allah Sharia. This, of course does not make you a disbeliever. This is a sin, because you accept in your hearts, that what Allah has legislated is the best and that we must follow Allah 's legislation. So let's take a simple example.
If a person drinks alcohol, does that make them a disbeliever?
No,
if a person drinks alcohol, it does not make them a disbeliever. And all the Muslims from the companions and all the scholars afterwards, except the extreme sect of the helot edge, which many scholars said they are not Muslim anyway, they all agree that no sin, the committing of a sin does not take you out of Islam. So if you drink alcohol, you do not become a disbeliever you are not you do not leave the fold of Islam. Yes, your Iman may hover above your head during that time you are drinking alcohol, but you do not actually stop becoming a disbeliever in fact that and the same with fornication, or adultery. And there were people who committed adultery in the time of the Prophet as
you know the woman and the man who committed adultery in the time of the Prophet and they came and they said, O Messenger of Allah employed
The last punishment on me.
And when they started reviling this woman, the prophet said, leave her, because her Toba is so great that it has its toll but the amount of this total would encompass all of the people of Medina.
So she did not become a disbeliever because of this act,
but if someone was to say, there is nothing wrong with drinking wine, it's halal.
Now, that would make someone a disbeliever. Because they had claimed now that what Allah made Haram, they made it halal.
Okay, so back to the the issue of democracy, there is no doubt that we Muslims must implement a lot of Sharia in our personal lives, because the Sharia is not only some punishments that we find in the Quran, like chopping off the hand of the thief, this is one of the Hadoop and that only four or five of such Hadoop, the shery eyes everything praying, fasting, your personal life, this is all the Sharia.
So we must implement this in our life. But if we were to fail, due to weakness in our eemaan, or due to being forced due to circumstance, not accepting it in our hearts, then this does not make us disbelievers.
This is very important to understand that.
So therefore, now let's go back and let us ask if democracy means that sovereignty is with the people that the people have the right to decide what's halal and haram. And it's up to them, then no Muslim with any mustard seeds worth of Eman can agree with this.
Just to illustrate, I want to tell you a joke. And it's not true. It's a joke.
There was this man.
There was this man who made he emigrated from the United States of America from San Francisco. he emigrated to Afghanistan. You know, when the Taliban were in power, he went to live there. So they said to him, they were asking him, it's just a joke. It's not true. They asked him, Why did you leave the land of the free in the land of the brave America with all the money and all the all those nice things and everything you want, and you came to live in Afghanistan? Why? He said, when I was a young man, homosexuality was a crime.
When I grew up, they made homosexuality lawful. In fact, they made it a crime not to, to dislike homosexuals, and call it homophobia. He said, I was afraid if I stayed around in America any longer, they would make it compulsory.
And really, if we think about it, this is the case of democracy. If you say the sovereignty or with the people, and the people can legislate, and the people can decide. I mean, here on the very basic philosophical level, I know that countries have constitutions. I know that different ideas of democracy encompass different limitations for minorities, and so on and so forth. But that's not what I'm discussing. I am discussing the very basic concepts, and that's it.
At the very basic concept, we all have to agree as Muslims, that making a crime which is a crime in Islam, to say it is actually a crime to have a problem with this crime. Do you understand what I'm saying? It's a criminal offence in England, to revile someone because of their homosexuality.
So now,
it has been made a crime, to hate the crime. Can we accept this as Muslims? Can we say that Islam is compatible with this? Does any person in this room think that this type of ideology is compatible with what Allah has revealed?
I hope not.
If he's Muslim,
and even if he's not Muslim logic would say no, I can see how your religion and this ideology are not compatible.
So on the very basic philosophical level, we have to say, Islam is not compatible with democracy. If we mean by democracy, that people have the right to legislate, and people have sovereignty.
But of course, democracy doesn't necessarily mean that
people have many different ideas.
of democracy.
People have many different concepts of what democracy constitutes. But it is not my task tonight, in order to discuss all of those different possibilities, and all of those different aspects, and how we could possibly reconcile Islam with democracy, I don't think we need to do that. Because I believe Islam has already fundamentally laid for us a good system, a good method of governance, and that good system. And that good method of governance was shown to us, first of all, by Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam.
In fact, if we go back, and we look to the life of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, what do we find?
We find that in many aspects,
the way that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam dealt with people was more fair and more just and more equitable than any democratic society that exists in the world today.
We have a system called Shura, which is consultation. And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam always used to consult his companions about any matter that was concerning their public affairs.
Or he would consult certain members of his companions, who are more experts in certain areas. So not everybody would be consulted about every single thing, because not everybody is knowledgeable about every single thing
of life. Types of shackles, first is other people imposed on us. And second, we impose the
Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam is a liberator he came to liberate the human beings, she relieves them of their burden, and he liberates them off their shackles.
What you
have Taqwa of Allah, and Allah will teach
will give you knowledge.
So this means the depth, which is faith in Allah subhanaw taala helps you to learn more from the
darkness was
with salvation reigns in wisdom.
Muslims do you need to challenge for somebody all their lives been thinking one way and all of a sudden somebody tell you
this life you have to struggle.
Man can have nothing except for what he's trying to
struggle with is the very nature of human being.
Just to illustrate, I want to tell you a joke. It's not true. It's a joke.
That was this man.
There was this man who made he emigrated from the United States of America from San Francisco. he emigrated to Afghanistan. You know, when the Taliban were in power, he went to live there. So they said to him, they were asking him it's just a joke. It's not true. They asked him, Why did you leave the land of the free in the land of the brave America with all the money and all the all those nice things and everything you want, and you came to live in Afghanistan? Why? He said, when I was a young man, homosexuality was a crime.
When I grew up, they made homosexuality lawful. In fact, they made it a crime not to to dislike homosexuals, and call it homophobia. He said, I was afraid if I stayed around in America any longer they would make it compulsory.
And really, if we think about it, this is the case of democracy, if you say the sovereignty or with the people, and the people can legislate, and the people can decide. I mean, here on the very basic philosophical level, I know that countries have constitutions. I know that different ideas of democracy encompass different limitations for minorities, and so on and so forth. But that's not what I'm discussing. I am discussing the very basic concepts, and that's it. At the very basic concepts. We all have to agree as Muslims, that making a crime, which is a crime in Islam, to say it is actually a crime to have a problem with this crime. Do you understand what I'm saying? It's a
criminal offence in England, to revile someone because of their homosexuality.
So now,
it has been made a crime, to hate the crime? Can we accept this as Muslims? Can we say that Islam is compatible with this? Does any person in this room think that this type of ideology is compatible with what Allah has revealed? I hope not.
If he's Muslim,
and even if he's not Muslim logic, would say, No, I can see how your religion and this ideology are not compatible.
So on the very basic philosophical level, we have to say, Islam is not compatible with democracy, if we mean by democracy, that people have the right to legislate, and people have sovereignty.
But of course, democracy doesn't necessarily mean that
people have many different ideas of democracy.
People have many different concepts of what democracy constitutes.
But it is not my task tonight, in order to discuss all of those different possibilities, and all of those different aspects, and how we could possibly reconcile Islam with democracy, I don't think we need to do that. Because I believe Islam has already fundamentally laid for us, a good system, a good method of governance, and that good system. And that good method of governance was shown to us, first of all, by Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam.
In fact, if we go back, and we look to the life of the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wasallam, what do we find?
We find that in many aspects,
the way that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam dealt with people was more fair and more just and more equitable than any democratic society that exists in the world today.
We have a system called Shura, which is consultation. And the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam always used to consult his companions, about any matter that was concerning their public affairs.
Or he would consult certain members of his companions, who are more experts in certain areas. So not everybody would be consulted about every single thing, because not everybody is knowledgeable about every single thing.
And in fact, this is common sense. I don't know about here in India, but in England, the government does not consult every single individual. When it wants to look into some detailed scientific matter, that is only understood by a few individuals, what do they do? They gather those individuals together, and they question them about this matter. And then they say, we have consulted the experts, and the experts tell us this and this and now that becomes our policy that makes sense.
So we have this type of consultative, interactive process that was given to us by the prophet muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and that operated on all different levels of society.
This is the way in which the Muslims should conduct themselves with justice, with understanding with compassion, we should love for our brother, what we love for ourselves. All of this means that we need to consider
So and discuss and share our knowledge amongst each other.
But I don't like to call this democracy. I like to call it Islam.
Why do we need to say Islam is democratic? For what reason, because that's the time when we feel we need to adjust our religion to fit this predominant culture and this predominant philosophy that seems to be dominating the world at the moment.
But I don't think we need to do that. In fact, I really don't like it at all.
I don't like it at all.
And I often give an example like this, it might shock you what I'm going to say, but I hope you will think about what I'm going to say.
Imagine we live in a society where prostitution is the normal modes by which a man and a woman physically interact with each other.
Imagine prostitution is so common, that it's the absolute norm. And imagine these prostitutes when you look at them, they all seem so happy, and they seem to be enjoying such a prosperous life. In fact, it seems that this society generally is very prosperous. They are building amazing machines, and they have great technology. And so you imagine that because they've got these machines, and they've got this technology, prostitution must be a good system as well. You think it all comes together in one big package? So some unfortunate Muslim comes along and says, You know what, we've got prostitution in Islam as well.
Yes, we do. It's called nica. You see, just as you go to the prostitute, and you give her money, we go to our wife, and we give her a hug. You seen, it's like prostitution.
When you go straight for a walk, how can you compare what Allah revealed and this beautiful way of life with that?
Therefore, I find it very sad. When Muslims start talking about Islam has democracy. Because to me, it sounds like saying Islam has Cooper.
It's like saying nikka is like prostitution. It's not. And democracy is not like Islam on its philosophical basis. And the only reason that we feel we have to say this is because of the dominance of Western culture, intellectually, philosophically and politically.
And it's another very stark warning for us. Why do we always feel that we have to accommodate and bend over backwards, and this is something we hear said a lot. Something we hear said a lot.
Muslims have to move into the 21st century.
Islam has to move and go with the flow, we have to adapt ourselves and change ourselves. As I read in an article recently, if Islam as we claim, is a way of life for all places, and all times, then Islam has to adjust itself for all places, and all times. This is another straw man,
you build up an argument only to knock it down yourself, but it's not what we claim.
We claim that Allah expects us to worship Him and follow his religion to the best of our ability in every place and every time, that does not mean
that Islam changes in order to make itself fit.
That is not what it means. If modern society conflicts with our religion, you know what I say? stuff, modern society, stuff it.
I need to worship Allah subhanho wa Taala? How long am I going to be here on this earth? A small amount of time?
I don't say and I'm not saying here, that there is a contradiction. There are many things in modern society that are perfectly compatible with Islam. And there are many things in modern society. Actually, they came from Islam originally. And in fact, this is the amazing thing, when we actually study many of the qualities that we find existing in the Western world. When we look at the history, we find that these things already existed in the Islamic civilization. And in fact, the west of those, though the West took those ideas from us, they implemented them and we stopped implementing them.
records that 911 was done by Muslims.
A hypothesis
Muslims are being targeted. The caller stares directly.
For the border bank for the power for the money. This houses of innocent people have been killed in Afghanistan. In Iraq, more people are being robbed, more people are being raped. The main purpose is what? It's an open secret
to terrorists, ethnic terrorists, Jewish terrorists, terrorists, there is not a monopoly. It is not.
We can take many examples.
If you read the writings, for example,
of Western observers of Islam, who were writing 150 years ago, they were praising how Islam did away with racism. How Islam was a religion that accommodated all races and all peoples. Now we find who is the one leading
and stepping forward in eliminating racism, it is America, it is Britain. It is these countries in their own countries, they are making big efforts to eliminate racism. It's not something they invented. We had that in our religion for hundreds of 100,000 for so many hundreds of years. But unfortunately, that is one thing that the Muslims that we had, and we've mustards
there are many things that we had, if we look in our religion,
the idea that it doesn't matter what background you're from, you could be the son of a dustbin cleaner, a farm worker, and you could be a scholar, you could be a doctor, you could be an engineer, you could do any career. If we look in history, and we search, where does this concept come from? If we look in the West, we find that the West had something very similar to the caste system, they had the feudal system, the feudal system meant that if you are born a peasant, the peasants were called serfs. If you are born a peasant bonus Earth, you are a virtual slave to your Lord, who is the landowner, you are a virtual slave, you stay the serf, you are born a serf, and you stay to serve.
You're born a merchant, you stayed a merchant, you were born a night, knighthood stayed in your family, you were born a Baron that stayed in your family. So all of these things were set in concrete, a serf could not become a knight, it couldn't happen. Nor did a knight become a tradesman.
Which civilization in the world do we find did not recognize such distinctions allowed freedom of movement between people and professions? Islam
is came from Islam, which civilization, if we look had a system of justice, where it didn't matter what part of society you are from, you can be the leader, you could be a noble man, you could be from whatever section of society.
But the khari, or the judge could bring you in front of him and make a judgement from you. And it didn't matter. This was Islam.
We have so many famous stories, and so many famous incidents from a life of the companions. And in fact, we can find so many true accounts of the justice of the Muslims. It didn't matter who you were, or from what part of society where you were, you were all under the same law. This is an idea that they have in the West. And I remember a friend of mine recently, he gave me not quite actually quite a long time ago. He phoned me up and Dick Cheney, Dick Cheney, who is one of the most important people in America very close to the parent, maybe even the vice president. I'm not quite sure. You may know that reason that he was recently taken to courts for corruption. So my friend
phoned me up, he said, Have you heard the news? You see these Americans that dick cheney is now in court for corruption? And this brother is a friend of mine. He's from he's from Dubai.
I said yes. Isn't that amazing? I wonder my brother, do you have anything like that in Dubai, where one of your princes or one of your leaders committed an actual corruption and he would stand in front of the court like that?
Then he got embarrassed. Then he got embarrassed and he didn't say anything. You see brothers and sisters, if you really want to know why.
If you really want to know why and you want to see why Allah has given these people power.
And the length and the power has gone from us is because these are the principles they live by.
They may have many bad qualities, but still, by and large, although I think it is changing, but still, by and large, they have this concept of justice,
and justice for all. But look at us look at the Muslims look at our lens, look at the way we treat each other. We can't even talk about each other. We can't even criticize each other in a just way we find this one from this group is criticizing that one from that group. Even though there is a man in his own group or his own sect who is doing something worse, but he doesn't criticize him, just because he's in another group, you'll criticize him, oh, you see him? He's doing this and doing that. But the one in his own group, he turns a blind eye. Is this justice? Is this justice. Or even you will lie against this person or slander this person or invent stories about this person? Is this
justice, we can't even deal with justice amongst each other. And these are the so called Islamic groups. How about the ordinary people. And we wonder why we are in such a state. If these are the things that we mean by democracy, that's not democracy. That's Islam. And that's what our religion towards us 1400 years ago, these things are our inheritance, which we have to claim.
And if we look at the kuffar and we can benefit, and we can see what they are doing, and the way they are doing it. And we feel that this is something that we can benefit from them. hamdulillah there is no problem with that.
But we don't, and we should never feel that we have to compromise our religion, we should never feel that we have to give up our Deen. We never feel we should never feel that we have to change our whole religion in order to accommodate some ideology that To tell you the truth, brothers and sisters, to tell you the real truth, democracy is falling apart.
In many, many countries, you will find that democracy is failing.
In fact, they are subtly bit by bit giving up on democracy. In fact, my personal belief is that there is no such thing as democracy anyway, it doesn't even exist. It doesn't even exist. What they have in the West, actually, in my opinion, is the illusion of democracy. It's the illusion of democracy. They make people think and believe that they have a choice, that they can influence things. But in reality, they can't change anything. The people who control the world have the same people who have always controlled the world. They are the big businesses, they are the multinational corporations, they are those few elite people who have the power and the money in their control. And
the world runs according to the principles they want. They don't care whether you have girlfriends or boyfriends, whether you're a homosexual, whether you drink alcohol, or take drugs. In fact, you know what they like that. Because the more you follow that corruption, the more miserable Your life will become. And the more miserable your life becomes, the more you need to fill your life, with fashion, with film, with drink, with music, with all the consumer things that they want you to say, look, buy this buy that have this have that that's the way to be happy, miserable people consume. So actually, it's for their benefit to create a society like that. So they imagine.
So I'm not really sure anyway, that the so called democracies even have democracy.
And one of the one of the things that highlights that for me, is that in England recently, not only in England, but in Italy, and all over Europe. They had massive demonstrations against the war in Iraq. In England, we had 2.5 million people gathered together to protest this will.
In Italy, it was five or 6 million. This is the biggest demonstrations that have ever been in history in Europe that we know about.
They found through polls that the majority, and in some cases, the large majority of the population, oppose this action. But they still went ahead and fought the war. What happened to the rule of the people, for the people by the people, what happened to the people deciding what we should do and what we shouldn't do?
And so we find in many countries, that is the case we find in many countries, that is the case.
I don't know much about Indian politics, but I suspect that a very
small minority actually decides what happens in this country. In America. In America, George Bush was not even democratically elected. He was appointed by the Supreme Courts. In fact, he was in the process of losing the election. He was in the process of losing it, and they stopped the counts is it's very famous what happened in in Florida. And in fact, they manipulated the vote so that george bush would win.
What sort of democracy is this? So this is what we really find that the famous saying goes, democracy is hypocrisy. And the reality is, when we look at these so called many of these so called democratic countries, what do we find? Exactly that hypocrisy, and I look forward to the day when Muslims will stop apologizing, stop being so apologetic, realize that they have the most beautiful Deen that doesn't need any changing. It doesn't need adjusting. All we need to do is recapture the true spirit of Islam, as it was practiced by the prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam. And then once again, again, brothers and sisters, once again, we will be a shining light and a guide for humanity
to follow, but this is going to happen. This is only going to happen when you change your life.
When you and me brothers and sisters, when we implement Allah's law in our life, when we implement our Sharia in our life, when we obey Allah, when we display the characteristics of gentleness and kindness and love and compassion and justice, yet at the same time, firmness upon obedience to Allah, we will see that when we have established the Islamic State in our hearts, Allah will establish the Islamic States on the earth Allahumma salli ala Muhammad he will early he certainly was.
Makes you fair and can and helpful to your fellow man. So living as a Muslim means that you must play
a lot of snaps
in you