The Muslim Civilisation – Problems and Solutions

Again decision I'm sure he had something to do with it.

It looks like we are live on Facebook now. Okay?

So brother Hashem send even let me know when we can start the introduction. Not fully now. Preparing the Facebook now. So I think one minute Yeah, we are now live. Okay. So I think you can start now. I

mean, there is some issues with electricity in Lebanon. So that's why some people are late but I mean we can start now with

this millionaire 100 in Lahore salat wa salam ala rasulillah. I will come everybody attending and in particular, our guest from London brother Adnan Rashid

brother Dan Rashid is a historian with a specialty in the history of Islamic civilization, comparative religion and the sciences of Quran and Hadith. He's taken a keen interest in Islamic numismatics, such as ancient manuscripts, coins and antiquities. He has debated many high profile figures in the field of politics, history, Muslim and Christian theology.

Brother Adnan has lectured in many prestigious international universities, including University of Warsaw in Poland, the American University of Beirut, in Lebanon, the Trinity College in Dublin and the Oxford University in Oxford, as well as LMS in Lahore, and many more. He has represented Islam and Muslims appearing on a number of radio and TV platforms such as the BBC Asian network, the Press TV, Accra TV, Islam channel, etc.

He is presently serving as a hottie at the West London Mosque where he is presently conducting an extensive course on the Tafseer of the Quran. But Adnan believes that Islam is a way of which promotes modernity in all of its positive manifestations, and provides practically realistic solutions for all the problems of mankind.

Without Nan's specialties include Islamic history, Sierra multifaith interest and

research.

Is the Trinity man made or divinely revealed? Is the Bible the Word of God? Jesus as and Mohammed sallallahu Sallam a comparative study,

the Sharia law, modernizing or terrorizing Islam and mercy of for the worlds the history of the Quran and the Bible and current affairs and the Muslim question

with what's going on in our civilization, and the world.

I'm gonna mute everybody for the time being.

As we see all the issues in the world, and all the allegations against the Muslims, from terrorism to this to that

it is really important for us to understand

what are the cause of the rise and the fall at times of the Muslim civilization.

With this, I will turn it to Brother Nan to take the podium and hear from his

wise

lectures and why is thought Shawn

please make sure you unmute yourself.

Sorry, I was muted. Okay. I'm in right now. Thank you. Yes, please. Thank you for inviting me. Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim al hamdu Lillah wa salatu salam ala rasulillah. About our rubella is a military ministry on the regime. sulla hiranya Rahim Allah Subhan Allah Allah, Allah Allah Allah mean for color sort of Lai sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, you know I had to come

at a Bali a Hema bolina see our Comic Con la salatu salam respected brothers and sisters. I thank you all for attending this meeting. And I thank elemental Islami from Lebanon Beirut for inviting me to address this

Important audience to discuss a very important matter which needs to be addressed by most Muslim intellectuals, if not all, the topic today is the Muslim civilization problems and solutions. What is the Muslim civilization is the first question I will address. And I will try to put things in a very simplified way, not simplistically in this necessarily, but in a simplified way so that we can all understand, without using too many academic and complicated terms, I will try to simplify things. Islamic civilization is basically the accumulation of the promise or the realization of the promise of Allah, which he made in the Quran in surah, Colombia, verse 107, where a lot of Allah

stated, how do we live in a shaytani r rajim Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim. Allah Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah me. In this verse, Allah told humanity that Muhammad Sallallahu Sallam has not been sent except as a as a mercy for the worlds. Okay, so the primary purpose or one of the primary reasons, the prophet of Islam, salatu salam came to this world wars, to spread the mercy of Allah spread the mercy found in the Quran, to introduce the mercy of Islam, to the world. And the Muslim civilization stands as a solid testimony to that promise. The Muslim civilization lasted for over 1000 years when I say lasted, I mean, the influence of Islam and Muslim random Muslim civilization

was felt seen and acknowledged by all civilizations around the world for over 1000 years. So, the problems about the Muslim civilization can be seen in what we have lost in the last, let's say, two to 300 years. History of ours, okay. Firstly, we need to understand what was the Muslim civilization? And what were the achievements and what have we actually lost? Do we still possess those achievements? Do we still exercise those virtues? Do we still possess all those qualities and characteristics we once cherished as a civilization? And if we have lost them, why did we lose them? And how can we revive that particular civilization if we have lost all those virtues? So firstly,

what is the Muslim civilization? The Muslim civilization basically was an outcome of the advent of the Prophet of Islam in the Arabian Peninsula in the seventh century. And through his teachings, a unique set of ideas was introduced to the world. And these ideas changed the intellectual, moral, economic, political, military landscape of the Arabian Peninsula, and the Land Beyond the Arabian Peninsula. And this change was long lasting, it was not like

a temporary change, like we have seen with other civilizations in human history. For example, the Mongols, I don't know if we can actually call the Mongol

invasions or the Mongol

civilization, a civilization in a true sense of the word but the Mongols did after invade invading all the lands of Asia Europe, and, and,

you know, lands beyond borders of all these, you know, countries Mongols had lived in the current day Central Asia.

Whether Mongols created a civilization or not is a very interesting question that can be addressed. But it didn't last. It did not last very long. Because the ideals or the ideas behind this expansion are not stable. They were not stable ideas, they were not necessarily

practical to use the right term. Likewise, the British Empire created an empire a civilization of its own, it did not last. It crumble. On the other hand, when we see the civilization of Islam, because it was inherently just because it had stable ideas, because it had an idea ideology called tawheed, and justice and compassion and mercy behind the expansion of Islam. This is why the civilization created by this particular expansion that took place in the seventh century lasted for over 1000 years and I believe it is still a

Living civilization, it has not lost it. It has not lost its power, its importance and significance, it is still a very much living civilization. No doubt it is on the decline, no doubt. For the last 200 years, the Muslim civilization has been facing severe problems on all the areas I will address in due course. So, in these 1000 years, what did the Muslims do Muslims established stable governments, and lands between Spain and China. This was the largest stretch of land ever governed by one group of people or one set of ideas.

And people united upon this idea of Islam, from China, to Spain. And

at one point, there was one government ruling all of this land, and Islam was introduced as a, as a solution to all the problems facing humanity at the time. And the result was

establishment of order, justice, and peace. I basically put it in very simple terms, I put it as follows that

Islam produced a golden chain of events, a golden chain of events, to put it in very simple and short terms. Right? What is that golden chain of events? Number one, lock number one, because every chain has locks. And in this chain, there are four locks. So lock number one was the Quran, the revelation of the Quran, from the Quran came the concept of justice, and from that concept of justice, came

peace, and then from peace came progress. So, progress cannot be achieved. Without peace, peace can cannot be achieved without justice. And justice cannot be achieved without, I believe, when it comes to the Muslim civilization, without the Quran, because the Quran was the root of the Muslim civilization, the Quran was the seed that bought the fruit, what we know today as the Muslim civilization, right, so Quran was at the root, it was the root cause of what occurred later on. So this was the golden chain of events, the revelation of the Quran, justice that

resulted

from that revelation, and then peace that was achieved through that justice, and progress that was made possible by that piece. And this has been confirmed by many non Muslim philosophers as well. There are philosophers like Adam Smith, who was writing in the 18th century, who talked about how important sense of security and justice is for mankind to make progress. Likewise, we'll do current writing in the 70s, a history of civilization. He writes in the first volume on the first page, that our civilization consists of four elements. And those four elements are economic provisions, political stability, pursuit of knowledge, and arts, and moral traditions. So these four elements,

produce a civilization and all of these four elements stand on one pillar and that one pillar is sense of justice. So this is exactly what the Muslims did. The early Muslims did exactly this. They brought the Quran to the world. And they demonstrated the teachings of the Quran. Through the actions, they established justice, they allowed the Jews and the Christians to live in peace and harmony with each other. And I have worked on this. And I'm working on a book which needs a review, the second edition needs to be published. And in this book, I argue that the Muslims produced the civilization through providing justice and peace to the masses. So once the Muslims had established

the governments in places like Spain, North Africa, or the Levant, where you are listening to me right now, okay, and land as far as India, and northern China wants Muslims had established the government, they offered justice, and from this justice, everyone experienced a level of peace, which was unprecedented, and even Christian authors writing in the early days of Islam, they testify to this justice. For example, there was an author writing in Syria man, a man called john bar Pankaj. He writes in the rain during the reign of mafia in ob Sofia under the law lawn. When he was the Khelifa in Damascus. He writes that there is so much peace in the world that we have never heard

about anything like it. Not

have our ancestors witnessed anything like it. This was a Christian living in the land of Syria testifying to the peace that was achieved by the Muslim

Empire if you want to call it that. So from that peace came progress and cut the long story short Muslim became the leaders of the world, and education

and political stability in economic provisions in pursuit of knowledge and arts and moral traditions. So the Muslims and introduced a very unique sense of Islamic morality in the world. The greatest achievement of Islam was not the scientific revolution, which was achieved in London close, or which was achieved in the libraries of Baghdad, or which was achieved in

observatories. In Central Asia, people always talk about ibnu Sina in the fees it will prevail. And other Muslim scientists like I will call him a Dharavi liberal hater. And, you know, ignore fairness and all these people that Muslim civilization is always narrowed down to the achievement, the scientific revolution that took place in the Muslim lands, no doubt, that is one of the branches. But what actually produced that branch is the question, what made that achievement possible in the first place is the important question. I believe the greatest achievement of Islam and the Muslim civilization was the sense of justice, a sense of peace, achieved through the Muslim moral values,

the moral values

that came from the Quran, and the teachings of the Prophet were the core reason as to why the peace and progress in justice was achieved and as to why later scientific progress, and all the achievements Muslims, and non Muslims living with the Muslims cherished. So the Muslim morality, the Muslim ethics, are at the root of all of this. And these ethics, and these moral values come from the Quran, and the teachings of the Prophet. So the greatest achievement of Islam

was this sense of morality and justice, which was instilled in the Muslim minds by the Quran and the Sunnah. Right? This is why, when people bring it down to the scientific achievement of few philosophers, a few scientists in London rose in, in Bogota, or in Damascus, or in places like Lebanon, or LA or book production in Aleppo, and some achievements in the Ottoman lands and mobile architecture. They actually do injustice to the Muslim civilization, we need to understand what caused all of this in the first place. It was caused by peace. This progress I just discussed was caused by piece, and that piece came from justice and justice actually originated from the Quranic

moral and ethical values. So for over 1000 years, Muslims dominated the fields of education, political stability, Muslim provided refuge for all persecuted societies of the world, Muslims protected the Jews against Christian persecution, which they were facing for over 1000 years, most of the Jewish people took refuge with the Muslims from a London close to all the way up to India. Okay. Of course, in India, the Jewish population was very small, but the Middle East, there were Jewish populations in Yemen, in Iraq, in Syria.

There were Jewish populations in North Africa in Spain, and these Jewish populations flourished throughout the Muslim period. Some of the greatest Jewish philosophers, thinkers, scientists, points,

theologians were produced during this Muslim period. Likewise, Christians also flourished in the Muslim lands due to the tolerance and the protection that was provided for them

which emanate which again emanated from the Quran and the Sunnah. Okay, this produced a flourishing civilization throughout this land between China and Spain, okay, Muslims came up with their unique art, the unique science, the unique culture, the unique philosophy, the unique libraries, the unique hospitals, their architectural achievements, all of this was done by this particular civilization. Right? And

all of this was unique. Muslims were very, very unique and achieving all this. So when people today equate

the Muslim civilization with the recent

unfortunate events taking place in the Middle East. And these events have taken place as a result of geopolitics of the region. When they equate those events with the Muslim civilization and the teachings of Islam, they are doing injustice to Islam and Muslims, and the history of Western civilization. If you want to talk about Islam, and the Muslims and what we have achieved, then we have to start with the life of the Prophet. And then we have to study the entire history of the Muslim civilization for over 1000 years and see whether we can attribute all that success, all that achievement, all that excellence in manners, in morality, in ethics, in philosophy, and intellectual

activity, in education, in economic stability, in tolerance, and coexistence, to Islam and the Muslim civilization. And if we can achieve, okay, and if we can attribute all of that to the Muslim civilization, then the outcome, or the conclusion is that the Muslim civilization was one of the greatest things that occurred in human history. So now, so to put it down to the greatest things Muslims achieved to summarize all of this what I have already said,

What are the Muslim achievements, education? Number one, the Muslims are taught most educators in the world. They were the most educated people in the world. They were the most bookly people in the world. The Muslims are the most bookly people in the world. Muslims were the largest book producers in the world. Muslims were the largest researchers are the biggest research academies and institutions existed existed in the Muslim lands. Okay. For example, to give you quick examples, Cordova, the city of Cordoba during the Middle Ages housed some of the largest libraries in the world. Calif. How can the second the homemade Calif, how come the second had the largest library in

the world, he had over 400,000 volumes in his private personal library. There were 70 public libraries in Cordoba, when there was no concept of libraries in the world at the time, libraries were for the elite in the Greek civilization, in the Roman civilization, and even in the Christian civilization, book production, book reading, and book.

indulgent indulgence was an enterprise for the elite. It was not for the public, and for the alarm, or for the masses. It was Islam and the Muslim civilization that made it common. So the Muslims led the way in education, through libraries, through books, book production, book copying, manuscripts, writing, book, art, you name it, this field in itself is absolutely fascinating. And because it's one of my areas of research, Islamic manuscripts, I have seen wonderful items, I have seen wonderful

pieces that have survived

the test of history, or the turmoil of history, to put it in the right terms. Right. So another achievements another achievement Muslims, had throughout the history of the Muslim civilization was political stability. Muslims produced political leaders that came forward to lead the Muslim world and liberated the Muslims from all sorts of problems they were facing, whether their problems came in the form of crusades, or whether problems came in the form of Mongol invasions, whether problems are caused by economic corruption, or whatever the case may be in different places at different times, the Muslims produced leaders who were able to politically lead the community out of these

crises,

then another achievement was

active.

Activism, Muslims are very, very active in the world. And when I say active, again, activism means when Muslims are on the front line, making sure that they are fighting injustice in all of the planet. Whatever opportunities came came their way Muslims took full advantage of those opportunities to do well by people. And to protect people against injustice. The activism was another achievement number four point number four I wish to address address in this talk, which was one of the achievements of the Muslim civilization was again

upon Allah, it missed my mind

was a media. Now you may be thinking that how did the Muslims take advantage of media throughout the history of 1000 years? I will tell you

With confidence that Muslims took full advantage of whatever forms of media that were available to them, media at that time was again poetry

book production, the member the use of the member, okay, whatever sources of information that Muslims had their hands on, they took full advantage of it. So, these are the problems we are facing since we have been in a decline for the last at least last 200 years as a civilization. First step is to acknowledge problems. The first step to improvement is to acknowledge a problem. If you want to treat a condition or disease, then the first thing is diagnosis, what we call diagnosis when you go to a doctor, the doctor must diagnose you, right. And once the diagnosis is done, then a medicine is prescribed. What are the problems we are facing today as a civilization as I stated, from all the

way from Bangladesh, to Morocco, we are a living civilization. The civilization of Islam is still living. Of course, we have many problems, but what are the biggest problems we are facing today in the world, we are facing those problems.

I have mentioned the achievements we had in the last, let's say, those 1000 years I talked about when the Muslim civilization was experienced, you know, was was at its peak. Those four points I mentioned, are the problems we are facing today. We are not leading the world in education, we are not leading the world, in political stability. We are not leading the world in activism, we are not leading the world, in media. So let me start with education very quickly. While in the past,

the Muslim world

was cherished as a beacon of light, the best universities in the world. Were in the Muslim lands, the Harvard, the Oxford, the Cambridge of the world. Were in Cordoba, in Baghdad, and Damascus and Aleppo, okay.

And later on in cities like Delhi, in India, okay, some are Bukhara, okay, these were the hubs of learning for the world, people from European countries would travel to these lands, and they would acquire knowledge from the Muslims and non Muslims teaching in these institutions because they were also free to teach.

That was the state of the Muslim leadership in education. Today, the tables have been turned. We have lost education, our leadership in education, and we have lost that partly because we have lost the very values, the very ethics

that made that particular achievement in the past possible in the first place. Okay, someone asked him on Moloch that how can we how can we be great, like those predecessors of ours? How can we be so great, like them? Moloch responded, what ever made them great, follow that and you will become great like them.

And one of the points Muhammad Iqbal basically, he stated in the Urdu language,

was just as Mr. Ma Ma sama Hawker noncore Antartica Koran Hawker. In other words, they were honorable people in the past, because they were solid Muslims, they were strong Muslims, but we have become disgraced because we have completely abandoned the Quran and his ethics and his values. So the Quranic values, made them great once upon a time. And when they took those values seriously, they created a civilization of an unprecedented scale, and they lead the world, in fields like education, having mastered the ethics, the morals, the Koran, and the theological sciences, the Muslims went into other fields, and they lead the world in those fields. Today, we have a dichotomy

between the secular knowledge and the religious knowledge. this dichotomy was created by colonial powers. It was deliberately created by colonial powers while Muslim institutions in the past taught theology. At the same time, Muslims are taught mathematics, most of the top medicine, Muslims are taught logic. Muslims are taught sciences, like astronomy, whatever is necessary for the time was taught in religious institutions. So the human sciences and the religious sciences, were all taught by the same institution, colonial powers, they made this dichotomy Okay, and this dichotomy

dichotomy and still exist to this day. Now, religious institutions are only producing religious scholars who master religion. And then we have secular so called secular institutions, producing people with secular knowledge. What we want to do today to lead the world in the fields of education, we have plenty of Muslim scientists don't get me wrong, we have plenty of Muslim thinkers and intellectuals, the weakness they have is that they lack in the theology, they lack knowledge of theology, that's why they cannot properly represent it. That's why they fail to represent their civilization properly. Our civilization is primarily based upon our theology. And once we make

progress in the field, we can only properly represent our civilization, once we understand it, once we study it, so. And if we look at the other side of the coin, we see religious scholars, religious authorities, they cannot represent our civilization properly, because they lack knowledge of fields like science,

maybe history, philosophy, logic and other things. For example, I'm not saying all scholars are like that, of course, there are exceptions out there. But these are very few exceptions where you can count them on your fingers on one hand, unfortunately, we have neglected

educational leadership, what we need now brothers and sisters, I'll give you practical solutions.

Education, how can we lead the world in education again, seek solid knowledge of Islamic theology, understand your basis, understand your fundamentals, understand the reasons why the Muslim civilization read the word lead the world in the first place, once you understand those, then acquire masters and PhDs in other fields that are known today as secular sciences, that are known today as secular sciences, and then

have professors, teachers, lecturers, teaching these subjects in institutions around the world today, who is teaching all these fields in the world today? If you look around the world, in western universities and beyond, you will see that most people who are teaching Islamic sciences, or Islamic history, or Islamic philosophy, or Islamic civilization, for that matter, are non Muslim names, which is great, which is fine, but where are the Muslims? The question is, where are those Muslim theologians, Muslim scholars who have spent 20 to 30 years of their lives teaching in religious institutions. Now the power struggle or the power dynamics have shifted to Western institutions.

Unfortunately, most leaders in the world, most leaders in the world are being produced by institutions based upon Western system of education.

This is an unfortunate reality.

You will not find Muslim leaders coming from Muslim religious institutions. The leaders of the Muslim world are mostly educated by Western style Western institutions in the world whether they are in the west or in the Muslim lands. Okay, now, I'm not saying that this is a bad thing I'm saying education is no one's

monopoly, the Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu Sallam he told us a heck metodo little moment okay.

Wisdom is the last property of a believer we take wisdom wherever it comes from. So how do we reverse this problem? How do we overcome this problem, we overcome this problem by bringing our theologians to realize get them to realize the problem that the problem is that the power dynamics have shifted to Western institutions. Until and unless we have that education, with theology with the education of the Muslim civilization with the Muslim traditional sciences, until we have that education accompanying the education of Muslim theology, we can not turn the tables again. So we need Muslim scholars like in the past, you see if you hate them, the man who is today

cherished or you know celebrated as one of the founders of optics, okay. He is also

celebrated for his contributions in the field of medicine, right?

For example, for example, alfawise me, okay, who is celebrated for inventing some of algorithm we use today To this day, okay. For example, our customer Dharavi, the man responsible for inventing surgical instruments do you think

These people only had knowledge of the sciences. They were theologian politics a lot. They were Muslim scholars, the science of Hades and the science of the fear and the science of Quran was on their fingertips before they went into these fields. And this is how they were able to properly represent the Muslim civilization throughout the world. This is how they were able to exert their influence in the European lands. throughout the Middle Ages, European scholars use their names and use the authorities to teach the sciences of course, the left the religion aside, but these people were theologians, as well as intellectuals, thinkers, philosophers, scientists, this is the

combination we need today, in terms of education, without theology. without the knowledge of Islam, your knowledge of secular Sciences is not going to support or benefit the Muslim civilization in the long run. This is one of the points I want to I want you to understand. And that's the solution. The solution is now produced scholars produce those scholars, and I'm talking to you, I am talking to you those who are listening to me right now, you need to be those scholars, you people need to think like that you need to start becoming those people. And not every one of you needs to be a muhaddith

professor or a four key or, or or a Lama or a mophie or scheffel Islam not one of none of you need to be like that, what you need is a solid grounding in your theology. And that takes easily three to four years if you are dedicated if you can spend four years studying secular sciences in a in a western style institution, I am pretty sure you can give two to three years to Muslim theology. And once you get this combination, the ball will start rolling in sha Allah, they will come a time 20 3040 years from now, we will start to see those Muslim intellectuals arising again we will start to see Allah kasali we will start to see a Razzie we will start we will start to see him not a

Mia's. We will start to see, shall you laws of our day and age once we start to take our theology as well as the worldly knowledge what we call the secular sciences seriously. It Nakayama Josie hora de la la one of the students of imitate me he stated that a lot of wheeled two types of books. Okay, those that are between two covers the Masai okay. And the other book Allah has revealed is the universe is the universe, you need to study the universe, the natural phenomenon, okay, you need to a natural phenomena, you need to study the natural phenomena and explain it. Talk about it. Currently, we are missing from the world of education. Unfortunately, we are not leading the world.

And it can be done. It can be reversed. Again, I'm a big fan of IQ. Well, the point of the East, as he was called, he stated RGB algebra. He got him up either on the handout the Williston better, even today, if we were to accumulate the emaan of Ibrahim, the fire can turn into flowers, the fire can turn into a garden for us, it's upon Allah. The next point I want to quickly address is politics. We have neglected the field of politics, again, everything comes back to our theology, our morals and our ethics, our politics, wherever we are, whether we are in the West, or whether we are in the Muslim, that's our politics has to be driven by the moral and ethical values of Islam, the moral and

ethical values of the Quran. And we must be very, very, very vigilant about the circumstances, about the times about the cultures, about the people we live with. We have to be very sensitive towards the circumstances of our age. And, and looking at those things, following the guidance of our alama we have to get involved in politics, in whatever form it is possible for us. Haram is not an option for us. We are Muslims, we believe in a line is messenger Haram is not an option for us. I am talking about halaal options. And if politics is divorced from theology, if politics is divorced from theology, what will result

you will have catastrophes, you will have disasters, you will have leaders who will cause major problems for societies. Hitler, for example, was a great example of that. Okay, politics without any involvement of a lot. Okay. This is why again to quote a cabal on another topic, very, very interesting topic.

He said, and this is deep, deep, deep wisdom, Allahu Akbar. When you think about it, it blows your mind away. If Paul said to Da Vinci, Assa t, so Raja th and JC This is by the way, the Urdu language, and poetry can be found in Islam and he was an Islamic point. He was a it was a mother*er he was an intellectual. He gave many solutions in his poetry. And in this verse, he's saying that if you separate being from CSR, Do da da see assets a Torah, Jackie Chan, Jay Z. If you separate your deen from your CSR, from your politics, then what is left is the way of Ganga Khan.

Then what is left is basically the Mongol way of governing Allahu Akbar, and it should think about the Muslim history. Every time Muslim leaders, Muslim politicians, Muslim, military,

leaders, Muslim generals, when they neglected Islam, as their way of

life or as they philosophy in life, they caused major disasters, they produced major disasters. So when you get involved in politics, remain focused on Muslim ethics and Muslim values. So this is another solution for us today. Whether we are in western lands, we must get involved in politics to have a voice so that our voice can be heard. And we cannot afford to neglect to ignore the political reality of today. If we are not present in the political arena, then there is no one to blame. But us I'll give you very quick examples, how important it is for you to be present in political arenas. When Rasulullah sallallahu Sallam sent the first

migrants from Mecca to Abba Sr. Right. Cut the long story short you are aware of the the details

have been asked for the loved one was sent from the Qureshi has to go and get these immigrants back to Makkah so that it can be tortured and punished. So our man asked, he went to the court of the king of Amazonia, the joshy and he requested from the joshy to give away these fugitives and the Joshi refused, he said, No, we will not give away these fugitives. And he refused because there was political representation. Listen to me carefully. There was political representation. How Jaffer been a bee pollen. The cousin of Rasulullah sallallahu Sallam he stood to represent his case, he stood up, he spoke up, he said, Okay, before you hand us over to these people who are torturing us,

let me give you my view. Let me give you what I believe in. Let me give you as to the reasons as to why we are here. And then Jaffer spoke and that was one of the most eloquent defenses of Islam. He told the king that we were a disgrace to people we were eating dead meat, we were worshipping idols, we were killing each other over petty things. And then this truthful man from a noble family came to us and he told us he's a prophet of Allah. And he told us to worship Allah alone and gives a cart and charity and do good deeds. Is there anything wrong with that? The King heard him and he said, There is nothing wrong with that. You may stay in my land as long as you'd like. And because of his

political representation, in a powerhouse of that land, whether you call it the parliament, whether you call it the Kings court, whether you call it whatever you like, okay, he was there to represent his people. Again, Haram is not an option for us. There are halaal ways we can do politics in the lands we're in, and we can do it based upon Islamic ethics and morality. Haram is absolutely not an option for us. And what makes halal and haram is clearly stated in the sources of Islam and halabi al haram origin and between them are doubtful matters.

Ignore or put aside the doubtful matters, and focus on the halaal options, there are plenty of them for us to do 100 in law, and when you when you do things politically, right, like the Muslims did in the past, Allah will give us the strength we had once upon a time and that strength was for the good of humanity. That strength enabled us to take care of humanity and human affairs and the world lived in peace, the world experienced peace. Next point I want to very quickly move on to is media, the negligence of media, the Messenger of Allah sallallahu Sallam never ignored and neglected media. He never ignored media. In fact, he used the media of his time very, very effectively. What was the

media of the time of the Messenger of Allah sallallahu Sallam? The points

The Arab, the Arabic points. So when the Arabs wanted to spread a message around the region, they would use the points to do the job. The points would make points these points would be spread around and the message would be spread around. So there was a point who had degraded the Messenger of Allah Azza wa sallam who had insulted the Messenger of Allah sallallahu Sallam in his poetry. How did the Prophet respond? Did he do this? It's not my problem. I don't have to defend myself. We don't need to get involved. We don't need to do anything. No, no, he put his point on the member Hassan Min tarbet he put them on the member and he said Oh Allah help Hassan with Jabra you. Oh Allah help him

and Hassan when David radula one he came out with gems Watson I mean column terracotta ayeni Allah min column tala denisa. Hola, kutamo Barbara and min Kalia in Karnataka Dalek Kamata shall allow a cover. This is how Hassan Min tarbet defended the Messenger of Allah solemn media, the Prophet sallallahu Sallam he used the media of the time effectively. He used the letters, he used people to announce he used his voice, he never let his voice be suppressed. He used all means of communication effectively. The Muslims today in the world, we are miskeen

we have no voice. We have no voice. If you think we have a voice, you are wrong. You are wrong. The Muslims have no voice, unfortunately. And this is because we do not control any of the major media outlets in the world. We do not control any news channels. We do not have our own, someone needs to tell our story,

our sight to the world. Because the world has been brainwashed into thinking that we are some barbaric aliens. We are not from this planet. We are some strange entities living in this world for the wrong reasons. Right. And this is only happening because we have lost our influence in the work. You must understand my brothers and sisters, that we must get our hands on the media, whether it is print media, whether it is electrical media, whether it's social media, we have to be acting, we can no longer ignore the importance of media, which is going around Alhamdulillah social media, the Muslims are out there. Muslims are representing the deen very powerfully, the good news is that

Muslims are waking up, we need more news channels coming from the Muslim youth. Okay, no one is stopping you. There is freedom. Now, you can go and use YouTube you can use your own means to make your own news channels. And if you are careful in your news giving if you are diligent in your content creation, then you will get credibility, you will gain credibility and you will be used by international outlets. So you cannot ignore media. You cannot ignore media. The final point before I quickly and I know my time is running out. I've gone on for very long. Before we get to q&a. Chuck, you wanted to come in you wanted to say something?

I actually wanted to start the q&a. So please go ahead and make your final point in Sean lejog. final point I wanted to make was activism. Okay. Muslims have also neglected this field. When I say activism, I'm talking about be active in leading global campaigns of justice. For example, you may be thinking you may think I'm thinking, you know,

I'm thinking I'm definitely I'm thinking outside of the box. I'm not thinking like ordinary Muslims. I am thinking about wildlife in Africa. Who is campaigning for it? Okay. I'm thinking about disease in places like South America. I'm thinking about rights of animals. I'm thinking about rights, environmental, environmental issues. I'm thinking about deforestation problem in the world. Our Prophet has given us teachings on all these areas. And this is am I inventing these things? No, there are 800 reports from the Messenger of Allah sallallahu Sallam on the rights of animals. 800 reports on the rights of animals. There are reports from the province of Islam on the virtues of

forestation. The profits are less I'm encouraged forestation and there is deforestation taking place in the Amazon jungle.

There are animals being poached in Africa, and those animals direct our ecosystem directly. It is affecting the whole world. The destruction of the wildlife in the world is destroying our planet. People don't realize it people think it's not it's not

I'm talking about activism, Muslim doctors, for example, there are so many Muslim doctors in Lebanon, in Pakistan in Egypt, okay? And other Muslim countries, okay? And why do they become doctors, they just want to make a clinic and make some money out of it. Okay? That's not the purpose of Islam and Muslim in this world. Our purpose is to make this world a better place to make this world a better place so that we can become the beacons of light again, so that people can talk about us in the future that the Muslim civilization was Forever Living. It never died. So doctors need to come out and start taking campaigns to Africa to South America to poorer lands in the world where

people need doctors. While I've been to Africa, one of the countries is Malawi. On average, there is one doctor for every 100,000 people.

There is one doctor in Malawi, for every 100,000 people.

And I'm telling you, maybe there are 10,000 doctors, for 1000 people in Egypt. And I'm not exaggerating, there are so many doctors in the Muslim world. Where are they? This is where activism comes in. We need to become active globally, as beacons of rights, justice, progression, and compassion. Once we start to lead these fields, once Muslims are on the front line on all these fields, the Islamic civilization will be revived, it will be resuscitated. So to finally, last sentence, to summarize the points I discussed will lead the world in the field of education, political stability and activity,

media, as well as activism. And we have lost that today. These are the four fields, these four fields we need to revive today so that we can once again celebrate the Muslim civilization which is still very much living it needs to be resuscitated. inshallah, thank you so much for listening to me zakum locker, and May Allah bless you all. And if there are any questions, please put them forward inshallah, and I'll address them to the best of my ability. Is that Colombia without net loss pantalla reward you for this enlightened talk? Or enlightening talk? Yes, we do have a couple of questions.

The sister is saying I agree with you definitely, that the Muslim civilization is huge, but it is diminished or retired? What are the real steps to regain the good image of Muslim civilization?

Very good question.

And, and and I have addressed that very question in those four points. And two points, in particular, to regain the good impression of the Muslim civilization to do away with all the propaganda and Islamophobia and hate against Islam. Now, basically, hate against Islam is normal. It is now accepted as the norm. And I'm talking about on mainstream Western channels. Okay, it is systematically put out from mainstream Western New channels, and even Hollywood, okay, is at it, it is not normal. How can we undo that? How can we respond to that, by two ways, media mastered the field of media, print media, electronic media, social media, be active, be present, don't just sit

on your phones, and go through Facebook and Instagram posts, rather post something get active and put the civilization of Islam out there. Instead of putting your selfies of your new hijab, or new lipstick or new cap in the in the, in the case of brothers, or, or, or a new car or something like that stuff, all of that. Okay, start promoting the civilization of Islam, which affects all of us globally, our impression is very important. When we travel around the world, we should be seen as the solution, not the problem. And that will only happen when we invest in media. We need to produce our own movies. So panela one program have to grow. I don't know if you watch it. I'm not saying we

should all watch it. I'm not saying that. But it's an example I have to give you. Okay, this program has truly inspired a lot of people although it's fictional, it's mostly fictional. It's not even factual, but it represents a particular culture during the Middle Ages. A Turkic culture, which was based upon Islamic values, somewhat Islamic values, right? And it has inspired a lot of people. It has brought these this nostalgic feeling about the Muslim civilization in the minds of people. And, and this is one program. Imagine if we produce movies like the message, okay? Once again, okay, imagine if we produce movies about our heroes in the history of Islam. Imagine if we start

To do that, okay, imagine how much inspiration our youth will get instead of following Superman and Spider Man and Iron Man, and having heroes like all these Hollywood people, and football stars and boxing fighters and all these people, they will have real heroes to follow. So media is very important and activism is another point to to gain back a good reputation for the civilization of Islam, I believe we need to work towards

activism, you know, getting involved in humanitarian causes, you know, being on the front line in fighting disease, injustice,

you know, wildlife destruction, deforestation, environmental crisis, all of these areas, we need to be on the front line, we need to be leaders so that the world can see that we are part of the solution, not a problem is

not the question is, is it fair to blame the Ottoman Empire for the decline of the Islamic civilization?

No, it is not fair to blame any empire for the decline of the Muslim civilization. In fact, the decline is not complete, yet. I believe the Muslim civilization is still a very much living civilization we are we ourselves are a symbol of that, that life, we still practice Islam, we are living as Muslims throughout the world, the Muslim civilization is still a flourishing civilization, it is a living civilization. We just need to explain it to the others, okay. And the decline is there, no doubt, I agree, there is a decline, but this decline can be stopped. And it can be reversed. If we take these points very, very seriously the four points I discussed in this lecture.

So we cannot blame the Mughals, the Ottomans, the AU beads, and the Mamelukes. They all played their role in their own capacities.

Unfortunately, the the Ottomans were the last great Muslim political entity to fall. That's why everyone thinks that Ottomans did all of it. No, the Ottomans were themselves victims of

an already growing decline. And they were the last victims of it. So we need to really think hard about our situation in the world and work collectively. And we need to go beyond our national boundaries, form alliances in other Muslim lands on organizational level, and do activism with other Muslim countries get the youth involved from all countries and do something you know.

I, you know, beyond national borders, I believe that Lebanese Muslims should be working with the Egyptian which seems to be working with Pakistanis Pakistanis should be working with Moroccans and this will bring back this feeling of the the living civilization of Islam inshallah.

Many attackers of Islam have Muslim names, claiming they're defending Islam,

how to help people to identify them as attackers. Okay, what you do is you simply defend Islam,

based upon your reasons. And you can also highlight that these attackers are simply

either confused, or they are, they have an agenda, right. But the way, the best way to confront these attackers is to get a voice. The reason why these attackers are given attention is because you don't have any independent media platforms, you have nothing. If you had big independent media platforms, then your voice would get out from those independent media platforms. And people would be able to see that these attackers are simply sellouts. They are simply possibly more thoughts. They don't even believe in Islam. And they are pretending to remember there are many cases like that one lie. There are many cases like that. In the Western world. There are people who don't believe in

Islam, they have abandoned Islam, and they use the Muslim names to confuse not only the non Muslims, but also Muslims, the Muslim youngsters, gullible youngsters, right. So the only way we can actually,

you know, practically overcome this is by having independent media outlets. We need many YouTubers, many, many, many Muslim youtubers with hundreds of 1000s of people following them. And once that happens, you will see numerous non Muslims watching your content and it is happening today. There are many non Muslims who are watching Muslim content, because it's, it's nicely produced. It's good quality, it's easy to understand. And once you start to do that, once you learn the skills from Western media outlets that they have some great skills to share. There are some great

skills to learn from Western media outlets, take those skills and use them for the celebration of the Muslim civilization and you will see that all of these people will be systematically

ignored and they will be completely you know,

they will never lose the value. So we need independent media outlets. That's the solution. We need intellectuals. We need educated,

sincere, practicing Muslim intellectuals who are out there active talking on behalf of Islam and inshallah this problem will go away.

Even the our toddler series is being watched by many non Muslims, and they're getting affected by positivity. Absolutely. This This series is very popular in South America out of all places, you would be shocked to see the amount of people who are watching this series in places like Mexico, Ecuador, and Venezuela, you will be really this is what media does. This is how Hollywood and Bollywood has exerted their influence on the world. There are people watching Indian movies in Nigeria.

What happened Nigerians to do with the Indian culture? But the Nigerians are saying they are singing indian songs. I'm pretty sure it's happening in Lebanon in Egypt, right? There are Arabs watching Indian movies. Why is this happening? is happening because we are absolutely negligent towards the power of media and producing movies. Last one a lot

of take a question from one sister and then go back to the question by one brother, do you feel that we have an issue? When it comes to funding for initiatives like Islamic movies and media campaigns? It seems like donors in our community venue funding charity work for basic services like food and medicine, more than such initiatives for media and

and the reasons why you are raising funds for charity and refugees and destitute people is because you have neglected is because you have neglected the intellectual representation of Islam on the global level. The reason why Muslims are so easily brutalized around the world, is because we have lost any sympathy from the people. people misunderstand us. People don't know about us, they don't know our story. They don't know what we have achieved in the past we did they don't know how good we are. Right? And that can only be achieved when we have independent representation for the world to hear it from our mouths for the world to see it from us. Right. So so we need to now start really

seriously investing in media, in movie production. In documentary making, even in cartoons and games, your children are watching Aladdin, they are watching The Lion King they are watching. You know, if you come from my generation, they're watching Mickey Mouse, not Mickey Mouse or Tom and Jerry and Pink Panther. Right? This is what your children are watching that your children look forward to Disney cartoons. Where are you hamdulillah there were some options created from the Muslim media outlets in the in the 90s in the in the 2000s. But it seems to have stopped, we really need to promote

good productions in the English language so that the world can get to know our stories, our history, our culture, we can produce cartoons, we can produce games for our children, we can produce movies, okay, and we can do the work of Islam through these. These methods. inshallah, and I'm not talking about haram things. I'm talking about purely Sharia compliant halaal options. That's what I'm talking about. And very interesting ones as well. It's,

of course, that's possible. All fully compliant. Helen,

this question is related to what we just talked about the media movies, isn't there a downside of creating chaos, for inviting everyone to produce their own content of media and movies? If yes, then how to deal with this potential chaos. Okay. You see, you're absolutely right. There has to be some control. But the control this is why I'm saying sensible educated. Muslims who are intellectually sound, need to take the lead. If there are idiots left to run anything in the world, you will have idiotic results. Okay. The reason why we have idiots running around the world doing things for us is because our intellectuals or educated scholars are activists are missing. They're not taking the

lead. We need to come forward. We need to produce more people who will take the lead and

Once we produce quality, substance, quality, researched, well informed substance, then it will take credence over all other ill produced ill researched works. So unfortunately, we cannot prevent people from producing content, we can't do that. What we do need to do is to produce good quality content, well researched content, well produced content. And that way we will take the lead in charlatan and and we need governments doing that we need private companies doing that we need Muslim millionaires, for example, funding projects like that. We need more museums, educating people about the civilization of Islam, we need more media houses, we need more media outlets, producing

documentaries on the civilization of Islam, even talking about the problems of the youth today, dealing with things practically not just ideologically or theoretically, rather, we need practical solutions. We need practical examples, not theoretical, not ideological only, okay ideas and theory, they only remain in the mind, they only they only make a difference when they are realized when they become real. So we need to become real, even on a smaller scale, at least it is something something is better than nothing. And when you start thinking big, Allah will do big things through you. We just need to have a big vision for the world. We need to get out of our neighborhoods, our cities,

our little boundaries created by the colonial establishment, we need to get out we need to have a global vision and use it you will see you will start to see the change in the world in sha Allah tala for the better in sha Allah.

Allah, we kind of started late.

So there are any more questions and actually I can open the podium to anyone who wants to ask the question verbally. And you can just unmute yourself

if anybody has any more questions.

Okay, if you have a nobody Okay, there's one new message here.

Dr. Adnan May Allah subhanaw taala grant you paradise and keep you on the straight path. I love you. And it's a common law. I mean, why y'all come where y'all come? Come up. So I will give you the last sentence to close our deca and our gathering today. Please have a tip for a couple of minutes.

Did you hear me brother then? Yes. Sorry. Go ahead. A couple of notes. Yeah, what I'm saying if you would like to have a final statement to give us any couple of words to end this inshallah Nika and this gathering, finally may Jazakallah home for inviting me May Allah bless you all for attending. And we ask Allah subhanaw taala to accept this from us. And we ask Allah to cause my words to enter your hearts and take them seriously if there are any errors of judgment of of delivery, they are purely mine. And I ask Allah for forgiveness. And we ask Allah subhanaw taala to enable us to see the flourishing of the Muslim civilization once again, so that we can within our lives see the rise

of the Muslim civilization and inshallah you know, cherish it once again in sha Allah and it can be done through many ways. I only shared four points. There are many more points you can come up with. Just study the Muslim civilization and its history you will find a lot more inspiration inshallah tada thank you so much 100 reliable Allah mean

does that Allah

hope to see you in Lebanon soon? inshallah. inshallah, thank you so much. I have to go I have another program, very radical. And may Allah bless you. Thank you so much. And please keep me in doors. I look forward to speaking to you guys very, very soon inshallah. salaam aleikum wa

Alaykum wa rahmatullah

wa sallam ceremony.