Bilal Philips – Why Islam

Bilal Philips

Have you ever wondered how Dr. Bilal Philips accepted Islam and became a Muslim? Listen to this inspiring video, which will refresh your faith and inspire you to be an amazing Muslim inshaAllah.

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AI: Summary ©

The speakers discuss their journey as student activists and members of the democratic party, including their experiences with Islam and their desire to become Muslims. They also discuss their plans to pursue Islam in their new countries and their efforts to correct mistakes with American troops. The importance of learning to become a Muslim person is emphasized, particularly for non-elaelaic Muslims who have struggles with bankruptcy and family problems. The goal of Islam is to bring Islam to the Muslim world and provide education and work opportunities for those who want to study.

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			Salam Alaikum
		
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			warahmatullahi wabarakatuh
		
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			so now what a cool Morocco to work at.
		
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			First, let me say
		
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			that the whole story about my conversion to Islam is available on YouTube
		
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			recorded in Malaysia in around 2001 and a half hour lecture.
		
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			And last year from the University of Nottingham in Malaysia also, the story was retold. So this is
like the third retelling of the story.
		
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			Well, this will be the first time that it's translated into Bahasa so.
		
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			So the story begins with my birth in Jamaica, Central America, known to you for Bob Marley.
		
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			And we're saying both
		
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			Okay, well Alhamdulillah
		
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			Jamaica is also known for bailout Phillips,
		
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			Muslim.
		
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			My parents took me to Canada, and I grew up in Canada.
		
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			From the time I was about seven years old, so I grew up in Toronto,
		
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			one of the largest cities in Canada.
		
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			And after graduating,
		
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			I migrated with my family to Sabah to Kota Kinabalu in Sabah. There I was preparing for entering
university in Canada.
		
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			I lived there for often on about two years.
		
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			And while I was there,
		
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			my mother adopted an Indonesian boy
		
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			who entered our family. My mother in law adopted this young man because of the fact that in
Indonesia that in Malaysia at that time, Indonesians who were born there didn't have the opportunity
for university studies. He was one of her students. My both my parents were teachers.
		
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			So this young man,
		
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			we knew him as Westman.
		
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			Later, I came to find out that the origin of his name was Sulaiman became Westman. As I think you
contract names this way. Anyway, he grew up with us. And myself, my brother, my sister, we observe
that he did different things, and we did when I had grown up as a Christian. And Christianity, of
course, was just going on Sundays to the church. But we did observe that sometimes we'd go in his
room and we would find him prostrating.
		
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			You know, and we didn't know what he was doing, because we had no idea what Islam was. My mother and
father had an idea about Islam. My mother had studied about Islam in university in Canada. So she
was very careful to make sure that our adopted brother would not be compromised, his religion
wouldn't be compromised. So she, during Ramadan, when He fasted, she would get up early in the
morning and prepare so who are for him.
		
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			And if we had dinner, eating pork, she would prepare fish for him.
		
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			And on Sundays with the Sunday dinner, they would we normally used to drink a small glass of wine,
so he would have grape juice you know?
		
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			So my, my mother was very careful.
		
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			But we didn't know what was going on. We didn't know we just knew he did different things.
Otherwise, he was the same as us. During this period of time also,
		
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			I, along with a couple other
		
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			sons of expatriates formed a rock group.
		
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			And
		
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			I used to play guitar and sing
		
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			on stage there in Sabah style styled myself after Jimi Hendrix, maybe this before most of your time,
but I was known as the Jimi Hendrix. So I played
		
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			there.
		
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			And the significance of this, I will tell you later on, but we had a three man group. And this was
another side of my life, which I continued for some time. I moved to Canada when I was accepted into
Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, and began my studies there and biochemistry.
		
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			And I became a student activist, because I became conscious of problems in the world.
		
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			And that led me to want to change the world to make the world a better place. And the only system
that was offering this change at the time was communism. Some of the professors lean towards
communism. So they
		
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			made our to our students to become communists. And I
		
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			converted to communism from Christianity. That's why I remain I went to the United States from
Canada. Before completing my degree in biochemistry, I went to San Francisco, Los Angeles, and I was
engaged with other student activists, you know, as a communist, and supporting communist causes in
the US for a couple of years.
		
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			However, I soon became disillusioned to
		
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			what communism claimed, and what was the reality on the ground.
		
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			Communism spoke about brotherhood and fraternity. But Stalin and Mao massacred millions of their
citizens.
		
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			There was no system of morality, whatever would forward the revolution was justified. And having
grown up in a practicing Christian home, I had a sense of right and wrong of morality, which
communism rejected as being
		
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			outdated and not effective in promoting the revolution.
		
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			I returned to Canada to Toronto, after those couple of years in the states
		
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			joined another Communist Party Movement in Toronto. But still in my mind, now I was starting to look
elsewhere to find some other system which could replace and provide what communism claimed to
provide.
		
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			And it was at this time that Allah subhanaw taala opened a window to me on Islam.
		
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			One of the members of the organization, a female, converted to Islam. So this caused me to wonder
why. So I asked her. Why, when we had been taught that religion was the opium of the masses, right?
It is a means of drugging the masses and exploiting them. So how could you then become a Muslim? So
she tried to explain to me that no, Islam was different. It's not like the other religions. Those
ideas came from looking at Christianity and how it operated. So I asked for some books to read.
		
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			And I discussed with some others who had converted to Islam, from the States, as well as some
Canadians there in Toronto at that time.
		
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			And after some period of discussion, and reading, I came to the conclusion that Islam was, in fact,
the summary of all that was good in communism and capitalism and Christianity, socialism, all of the
good that was identified there was in Islam, and all of the evils found in these systems were not
present in Islam. So I became convinced that at least intellectually, I was convinced that Islam was
the answer, for changing the situation of human beings for human society, to be adjust a fair
society. But I had lived
		
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			now, for years in communism,
		
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			years in which I denied the existence of God,
		
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			and had accepted that there is no God.
		
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			So though, I realized that Islam, intellectually, was the true way for human society, spiritually, I
wasn't able to accept, because
		
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			I didn't believe in God.
		
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			So it took another event, or experience, to bring my soul, my heart
		
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			to Islam. What happened was that I was living in a commune. This is a house in which
		
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			different people had rooms, and we shared the rent and shared the cooking and the different things
together, but we're all individuals, students at university and others.
		
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			And
		
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			in my room, I used to read a lot. So I had a lot of books there. And
		
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			people used to come into my room from time to time, even when I wasn't there to use the books read
from the books.
		
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			And one day, when I had laying down on the bed just to rest,
		
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			I
		
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			went into a state between
		
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			being awake and being asleep, meaning I started to dream. But I was aware that I was in the room and
I could see some people who had come in and were sitting at the desk, my desk, and were reading some
of my books. And I started to have this dream.
		
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			So I saw myself in this dream,
		
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			entering a huge warehouse entering into this huge building, there was a door, I came in, I had a
bicycle with me, I used to ride a bicycle for exercise. I was walking in this structure, with my
bike walking in, it's dark inside, but I'm walking in. And as I go deeper and deeper into the
building, I would turn and look to see make sure that the doorway I came through was still there,
right.
		
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			But somehow, I was driven to keep going deeper and deeper. And of course, as I went deeper and
deeper, the doorway became smaller and smaller. Right. And I started to develop fear of what might
happen, but still, I was driven to keep going in. And, of course, eventually, I reached the point
where I turned around, and I couldn't see the door anymore. So I was in complete darkness. And at
that point,
		
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			I was overcome by fear. Fear that
		
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			If I didn't get out of this situation, I would never
		
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			escape, I would, in fact, die. It was fear of death struck me. So I
		
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			began to scream. Those people who I could still somehow see sitting at the desk, though I was in
this state of complete darkness, I was aware that they were sitting there and I started to scream,
help me, help me, you know, to get me out of the situation. But no sound would come out of my mouth,
I was screaming in my head, but no sounds would come out of my throat. So of course, they didn't
hear me, I'm screaming, I can't reach them. And I reached the point of submission in the sense of
giving up, I just reached a point after screaming, screaming, they couldn't help me, I couldn't help
myself, I was reached a point where I said, I'm lost, I'm finished.
		
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			And at that point, when I let go, believing that I was finished, I woke up.
		
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			I came out of it.
		
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			So later, I came to know that, you know, many people have this experience, where you feel yourself
in a dream, you want to get out and you're just stuck there, you can't, you know, most people have
experiences some time or the other. For me, that was the first time I've never experienced that
before. So, in my mind, I interpreted it as proof, spiritual proof that there is a God, because I
couldn't help myself. The people in the room couldn't get me out of that situation. So then how did
I get out? The only other explanation that remained was God, God brought me out to that. So that was
the spiritual leap that I needed to make to accept Islam in its totality.
		
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			So at this point, I was ready to accept the Islam.
		
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			I declared my Shahada
		
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			and that was 1972. I declared my Shahada. And then, I was taught Salah,
		
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			right, same day, when I was taught Salah,
		
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			and I was taught sujood, then it clicked in my mind that my adopted brother was a Muslim.
		
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			Because he had never said anything about Islam to myself, or my brothers and sisters, he never said
anything. We were too shy to ask him. And he was a guest too shy to say anything. So it was at that
point, I realized that he was a Muslim. And by then he had gone to, to Ottawa with my parents, he
was studying in the University of Ottawa. And immediately I decided to go to Ottawa to see him share
with him that I'd become a Muslim. But also,
		
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			I wanted to share my anger, because that I had been all those years with him. And he never said
anything about Islam.
		
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			Because this was wrong, he should have said something. So when I went to Ottawa, and I met him, and
I told him, I had become Muslim is very happy. I hugged him and everything, but then afterwards, I
pushed him back and said, Why didn't you say anything about Islam? You know, all those years I had
to go through, you could have saved me all of that, you know, the communist and stuff, you know, to
have told me about Islam. So he tried to explain it said, you know, your parents were so kind to me
to help me. I didn't want to introduce anything which would create confusion in the family, maybe
make them upset. And so I wanted to, you know, avoid that they were good to me, I wanted to remain
		
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			good to them. But I said, this is not acceptable. Not acceptable. And no, that's your excuse, but
it's not an excuse before Allah, you have a duty You should have told me, You know, I was quite
upset. But humble afterwards.
		
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			Then, you know, we embraced each other again, and I was able to get over it.
		
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			So at this point, of course, after accepting Islam, I started to give Dawa to both my parents tried
to encourage them to become Muslims. My brother and sisters.
		
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			You know, by the same father and mother, I tried to encourage them to become Muslims. And I tried to
learn as much as I could about Islam there in Canada.
		
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			But in my efforts to try to learn Islam in Canada, because there were no real scholars there, there
were just migrants, people that come from different parts of the Muslim world, from India, Pakistan,
from Egypt, Morocco, and they're different places. So I would just try to get as much as I can from
each person, they would tell me something, and I would take note of it, etc.
		
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			And
		
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			I reached a point of confusion there in Canada, that though I'd accepted Islam, when I was trying to
learn from all these different people, I started to hear different stories, different explanations.
		
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			So, I had to make a decision, what am I going to do with this? So, you know, I had gone when I first
became Muslim, with a group of brothers from from Pakistan and India,
		
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			who were part of a movement called Jamaat oblique. So I traveled with them. And they convinced me
that I should be a hanafy.
		
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			So I decided to become more hanafy.
		
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			Then, after studying with them and getting as much information as I could, I moved with my wife
close to the masjid. And the mom of this mustard I moved next to he was from Egypt. So he started to
teach me from critical sunlight, basically, Shafi mahtab.
		
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			So I started to see contradictions and issues. And then I befriended some brothers from Morocco, who
are explaining to me about how life was the Muslim life in Morocco. And they started to show me the
Maliki method.
		
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			So this is where I reached a point, I said, I had to decide I thought Islam was one.
		
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			No, I know Christianity had all of these different sects and things with Islam was supposed to be
just one. So what was going on here?
		
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			They tried to convince me that all the mud hubs were correct. But you just have to follow one.
		
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			Doesn't matter which one you follow, but just follow one. They're all correct. So, though, they were
telling me they were all right, I saw problems. That couldn't be explained with that explanation. I
saw very clearly, that the shaft a school was saying that if a man accidentally touches a woman, his
will do is gone, and her will do is gone.
		
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			And the Hanafi madhhab was saying, if a man accidentally touches a woman, his will do is find it's
not gone, her will do is not gone. So if both of them was right, if both hanafy and Shafi were
right, then it means it is possible for you to have to do and not have to do at the same time.
		
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			So I couldn't accept this. Just like I couldn't accept in Christianity, that God was three in one.
		
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			They said he was one but then there's God the Father, God, the Son, God, the Holy Spirit's three
gods in one. So he was one and he was three, that to accept that you have to shut off your brain.
		
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			So in the same way to accept that you could have to do and not have to do at the same time, you have
to shut off your brain.
		
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			So at that point, I decided I needed to leave Canada. I needed to go back to where Islam started.
		
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			And Allah opened the door. scholarship was available to go and study in Medina. At that time, nobody
wanted the scholarships. There. We said this is a waste of time to go study in Medina, you know,
they're teaching from old yellow books that are covered in dust. You know, it's ancient stuff not
applicable to your daily life. You won't be able to look after your home your family, you know if
you studied there, but I said I need to know Islam. I need to get to the sources and understand this
way of life, which I believe is correct. There is an explanation for what was confused to me. So I
decided to go there anyway. So after studying the Al Hamdulillah, it became clear to
		
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			To me what the problem was that the problem was really, people. It's not really the dean. Right?
		
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			I came to realize that Imam Abu hanifa wasn't the Hanafi
		
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			and Imam Shafi wasn't a sharpie,
		
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			the Sharpie school, and Imam Shafi are two different things.
		
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			Meaning that the rulings that are in the Shafi school some of them were the opinion of Abu hanifa of
Imam Shafi, but many of them were not.
		
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			Same thing in the Hanafi school. So then the question became, so what was the mud hub of the mama
Shafi?
		
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			What was the main hub of Imam Abu hanifa?
		
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			Then from my study, it became clear that they both had the same mother.
		
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			They along with the mom, Malik, and Ahmed, even the humble, all of them followed one madhhab.
		
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			That one month hub was the main hub of Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wasallam.
		
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			It was the main hub of Abu Bakar of Omar Osman and Ali that was their mother. Because really, if we
are to follow a madhhab, meaning a ruling,
		
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			the rulings of one particular
		
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			scholar of the past
		
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			wasn't abubaker, the best of the oma.
		
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			So isn't his madhab the best to follow.
		
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			That is logical, but is the logical conclusion. So the madhhab, which he followed is the madhhab
followed by all of the early scholars of Islam, whether they're in the well known mud hubs or
outside the well known methods, they were all seeking to follow the mud hub of Rasulullah sallallahu
wasallam. And this is what is obligatory on every Muslim.
		
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			So both Abu hanifa and Mama Shafi said it Sahil Hadith for Hua Madhavi if the Hadith is correct,
then that is my true madhhab. That was their statement clarifying that they were striving to follow
the way of Rasulullah sallallahu wasallam. So when we come back to that issue, when you touch a
woman is your widow broken and hers broken or not? We have to go back to the Hadith. And there is
authentic hadith that Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu Sallam kissed his wives and led the Salah.
		
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			So if a man touching a woman breaks his will do then what are we saying about Rasulullah sallallahu
sallam. So this is the point. It was right and wrong. In this case, the Hanafi school ruling of Abu
hanifa was the correct ruling your will do is not broken. So you don't have to do what many people
do from the shelf it might have been different parts of the world, that when you're going for Hajj,
your local molana or shares or whatever will tell you listen, you make the Nia, the special duar you
make that you are going for Hajj as a Hanafi.
		
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			And when you come back from * make another da da that turns you back into a xiaofei. We don't
have to do this.
		
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			So I've hunted in Medina when I was there in the mid 70s. I studied there under chef and also Dena
lalvani. He was one of the teachers whose classes I sat in regularly.
		
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			I also studied under chef bin bars later became a translator for shipment bars in Riyadh. I studied
under shirehampton Arsenal Ubud as well as share Qmobile I studied krige Hadith, in the home of
shell mill. And hamdulillah. You know, that was a wonderful period of time, in which there was so
much knowledge available from leading scholars of that time have included of course is checkable,
bacara, desirae, and others.
		
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			having graduated from Medina, I went to Riyadh, I did my masters, as you heard in Riyadh, Riyadh
University, became a teacher at the same time teaching in high school
		
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			My parents came to Riyadh actually before me as teachers there, and I taught Islamic Studies at the
same school in which they managed, called menarik Riyadh schools. And I continued to try to give
them power in no time now have passed some six years since I accepted Islam. So during the next
		
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			10 years, I continue to try to give them down in Riyadh. But they didn't convert.
		
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			During this period in the 80s, I became involved in giving Dawa, to people in Riyadh, foreigners
were there, mostly Filipinos, and found hamdulillah that the Filipinos are very receptive to Islam,
many of them converted, I started to translate the hubbub Juma into English for them is the first
translations of quick buzz which are done in Saudi Arabia. And from that, eventually, we set up the
first data center in Bogota,
		
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			which later became hundreds of data centers all across Saudi Arabia.
		
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			In 1991.
		
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			After the Gulf War, first Gulf War with Saddam Hussein, and half a million American troops were
brought into Saudi Arabia, supposedly to fight them. After the Gulf War, they had to be processed
back out of the country. And I led a team of duat
		
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			where we set up in their camp, their main camp in Hobart, Khobar Towers in eastern Arabia,
		
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			a dour tent, which was called the Saudi Arabian cultural information tent, and Alhamdulillah. In the
next five months, from the time we started five and a half months, we had over 3000 American troops
accepted Islam hamdulillah. After that, in
		
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			93, I completed my PhD
		
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			from the University of Wales, and I went to Canada to visit my parents because by the end of the
19th, they went back to Canada, I went to visit them.
		
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			And Alhamdulillah
		
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			when I stayed with them about the second night after I had gotten there, my mother and then my
father came to me, and both said they wanted to become Muslims.
		
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			So that was, you could say, one of the happiest days of my life. Both of my parents took Shahada on
the same day. So this was after 21 years of Dawa, I had given them Tao for 21 years, they both
accepted Islam Actually, I had already given up.
		
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			earlier than the 21 years, I had tried everything that I thought I could.
		
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			I had written a book, based on a lecture, which I gave in Riyadh, called the true religion of God.
This book I had written, I given it as a lecture, and I'd asked my parents to edit for me. From the
English perspective, my dad was a English expert. My mom's very strong in English also, but she was
a science teacher. But anyway, both of them went over the book. And I asked them, if there was
anything they found wrong to let me
		
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			correct it. You know, if there are any mistakes with a grammatical or even conceptually, even ideas,
if it wasn't well presented, let me know so I could correct it, and give me their suggestions. So
they went through the whole book, and made some suggestions changes, I made the changes, etc. And
after they said, yeah, it's fine. Now I said, So then why don't you become Muslims?
		
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			But
		
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			they said, Okay, give us a call, and we'll start to read it. So that was a step. But they didn't
accept Islam. And I this is after trying, as I said, virtually everything. So when they came to me
and said they want to become Muslims. Afterwards, I spoke with my mother and asked her Okay, why did
you guys decide now? Why not back then when I had you read the book, and I'd explained and so many
things to you.
		
00:34:41 --> 00:34:43
			And she said
		
00:34:44 --> 00:34:48
			that there were main two main factors. One,
		
00:34:49 --> 00:34:59
			that they could see my behavior to them, how I treated them, how I loved them, looked after them was
all
		
00:35:00 --> 00:35:39
			Always contacting them, my brother and sister who are now adults, etc. Oh, my brother was a PhD,
also professor in university. But whatever problems they had in their lives, they would say, You're
the reason pointing to my parents, you know, they blame my parents for everything that went wrong in
their lives. Whereas I refuse to do that. I looked at them as having tried their best, and would not
blame them. So they could see the difference what Islam made in my life in terms of how I treated
them. So the other thing, which my mom explained to me, was that
		
00:35:40 --> 00:35:52
			when they were in Jeddah was after they ran the school in Riyadh, then they went back to Canada,
they came back to Judah to work for a few more years in Judah.
		
00:35:53 --> 00:35:59
			I had gone to visit my mother. And she told me that
		
00:36:00 --> 00:36:11
			she was seeing and feeling there was something in the house, you know, she would see something
seeming to move very quickly, she couldn't see exactly where it was what it was.
		
00:36:12 --> 00:36:28
			But she felt it was something like an evil spirit or something that was there. So she made with
crochet, I don't know if you know, crochet, but this is kind of a knitting women knit. So she
knitted a cross.
		
00:36:30 --> 00:36:53
			And she put it over the door, right? And the thing still ran around, it was still moving around in
the house, the cross did nothing, right. So she came and when I came to visit, she told me about the
problem. So I took the Quran, and I recited read Surah Al Baqarah,
		
00:36:54 --> 00:36:56
			in the living room in the house. So Rebecca.
		
00:36:57 --> 00:36:58
			And
		
00:37:00 --> 00:37:01
			I went back to Riyadh.
		
00:37:02 --> 00:37:07
			And I didn't think about it after that. She said, you know, after you read through Al Baqarah, it
stopped.
		
00:37:10 --> 00:37:34
			So she said that was proved to me that there is something about Islam, which although she was
looking at Islam and Christianity as being about the same, you know, she had a good idea about
Islam, Christianity, but then she said that showed her that there is something Islam had that
Christianity didn't have, that had to do with this belief in God, etc. So
		
00:37:36 --> 00:38:22
			hamdulillah that was the other point for her, which made helped make her make that decision to
become a Muslim. So inshallah, if you're having this in your home, use so Al Baqarah prophesize,
Allah said, he reads to Al Baqarah, no shaytan will not come to your home for like three days and
nights. So you use it. This is you see the power of it, Allah Akbar, you should use it yourself.
This is what the Bible says Adam has given us and don't use the other things. I know there are other
people who tell you you have spirits. You need to do this pour water in or you need to write things
and burn things and wear things and all kinds of other No, that is not from Islam. So Al Baqarah is
		
00:38:22 --> 00:38:26
			what Rasulullah sallallahu Sallam gave us a wild sigh.
		
00:38:27 --> 00:38:39
			After accepted and sorry, after I completed my PhD, I became a university professor of Arabic and
Islamic Studies in the UAE and moved to the UAE I was teaching in the university there.
		
00:38:40 --> 00:38:48
			And I started the first dollar center in the UAE in Dubai and ran it.
		
00:38:50 --> 00:38:50
			And
		
00:38:52 --> 00:39:01
			towards the end of the 90s. I had many students who are studying in circles that I did in mustards
and centers there.
		
00:39:02 --> 00:39:11
			One student came to me and asked me a question, you know, whether
		
00:39:12 --> 00:39:15
			I had lived in Sabah,
		
00:39:17 --> 00:39:42
			he was a Malaysian. He asked me, so I said, Yeah, I did. I said, why I said, because my brother, he
had taken one of my books back to Sabah and showed it to his brother, because he was younger. His
brother was from my age group. Actually, his brother was a student in the school that I went to a
close friend of my brother.
		
00:39:43 --> 00:39:59
			So when he saw the name and that though my name had changed, right but still Phillips was still
there. My family name I Bilbao Phillips. Born in Jamaica, he's saying I wonder whether the same
person so he had his brother asked me and I confirmed it. So they
		
00:40:00 --> 00:40:24
			invited me to come to Sabah I to visit Sabah. And when I went there, I met the former members of the
group, the rock group from 20 years 3040 years before and Allahu Akbar, both of the other two band
members had accepted Islam.
		
00:40:26 --> 00:41:20
			One had gone to Australia accepted Islam in Australia. The other one accepted Islam there in Kota
Kinabalu. And I accepted Islam in Canada. Allahu Akbar. So that was a beautiful ending. And that
basically, you know, concludes my story. Of course, in the in 2000, year 2000, I set up University,
you've heard about it Islamic online university. And this is where I'm mostly focused now. We have
over 250,000 students around the world. And the goal is to spread the teachings of Islam to all who
wish to find it, particularly to the Muslim world, to Muslims, and even to non Muslims who want to
know what Islam is. So, although you might think
		
00:41:22 --> 00:41:29
			that if I have a university with 250,000 students, I must be a millionaire.
		
00:41:32 --> 00:41:36
			Because all it takes is for each one to pay $10 I'm a millionaire.
		
00:41:37 --> 00:41:40
			However, just to let you know,
		
00:41:41 --> 00:41:47
			of the 250,000 students, 245,000 of them study for free.
		
00:41:49 --> 00:41:55
			There are no costs at all, it's absolutely free, no hidden costs. So I'm not a millionaire,
		
00:41:56 --> 00:42:11
			the 5000 students who actually pay fees, which are very, very low fees, that is used to run the
university, and hamdulillah this is what we're bringing here to Indonesia, and inshallah we hope to
		
00:42:12 --> 00:42:33
			spread information about it. And those of you who want to understand English who want to study the
deen in English, you can do it now from your home. You don't have to go into travel to Saudi Arabia
or to Egypt or whatever you can do it right from your own home Alhamdulillah
		
00:42:34 --> 00:42:38
			Okay, the last point I just like to raise is that if any of you
		
00:42:39 --> 00:42:44
			know English and would like to contribute
		
00:42:45 --> 00:42:52
			to the translation of my university course, from
		
00:42:54 --> 00:42:57
			from English to Bahasa,
		
00:42:58 --> 00:43:14
			please contact the organizers of this program are representatives from the Islamic online university
here. We have Dotto we have another brother ID we had our from Joe jogjakarta.
		
00:43:16 --> 00:43:18
			To participate
		
00:43:19 --> 00:43:48
			with us in this effort to make that university available to the majority of people in Indonesia and
Sharma. This is the goal to spread the knowledge and I know that most of you don't know English. So
we are trying now to turn this program into Indonesia, Anand Sharma, what is the most appealing or
what is most appealing from Islam that attracted you to it?
		
00:43:49 --> 00:43:51
			Actually, I already explained in the
		
00:43:53 --> 00:43:58
			presentation that it was the completeness of Islam
		
00:44:00 --> 00:44:01
			in
		
00:44:02 --> 00:44:11
			offering solutions to all aspects of life, its comprehensiveness that it covers.
		
00:44:16 --> 00:44:19
			Personally, I would say that
		
00:44:20 --> 00:44:25
			becoming a Muslim, the path in life became clear.
		
00:44:27 --> 00:44:38
			Before being a Muslim, I was unsure of what was right what was wrong. trying this trying that.
		
00:44:39 --> 00:44:45
			Once one accepts Islam then sirata mR came the straight path
		
00:44:47 --> 00:44:59
			in all affairs becomes clear. life becomes much easier, because you don't have to be trying to
figure out this and figure out that
		
00:45:00 --> 00:45:03
			islamize made the clear way for you
		
00:45:12 --> 00:45:16
			to answer or not okay, there's another part to the question.
		
00:45:17 --> 00:45:19
			What would be my advice to
		
00:45:21 --> 00:45:23
			doing dour in Indonesia
		
00:45:26 --> 00:45:28
			where Muslims
		
00:45:32 --> 00:45:35
			don't really know Islam properly.
		
00:45:37 --> 00:45:39
			They're unfamiliar with the sun now.
		
00:45:41 --> 00:45:44
			And the non Muslims are sick of Islam
		
00:45:49 --> 00:45:50
			that
		
00:45:52 --> 00:45:55
			the solution is to
		
00:45:57 --> 00:46:00
			learn Islam spread knowledge of Islam.
		
00:46:02 --> 00:46:03
			And
		
00:46:04 --> 00:46:08
			that will be enough to bring people back to Islam.
		
00:46:10 --> 00:46:40
			And when non Muslims know what the true teachings of Islam are, then inshallah they will accept
Islam, as I experienced, where we had a chance to give Dawa, to the American troops, so many of them
accepted Islam so easily. And I'm more than 20 people a day were accepting Islam. And that was just
because they were able to hear Islam correctly.
		
00:46:42 --> 00:46:43
			So I got what
		
00:46:45 --> 00:47:17
			I would like to ask sir Bilal Philips, how are you sir? right at home rely on yourself? It's, it's
glad to have you here. But I'm wondering like, do you have any down situation during your hegira
period like, like what we have here, like, when we do hit Dre, and the bankruptcy is coming to us or
our family avoiding us or or any difficulties that came to us during our period? Do we have such
things like that? Thank you.
		
00:47:20 --> 00:47:28
			By hedger, I'm understanding that you're talking about the transition into Islam.
		
00:47:31 --> 00:47:43
			Alhamdulillah I really didn't have any problems because my parents who are positive they accepted my
acceptance of Islam. And
		
00:47:45 --> 00:47:59
			so my journey into Islam was quite simple. I have many friends who had many difficulties, some
kicked out of their homes. I remember one Jewish friend even told me that
		
00:48:00 --> 00:48:06
			his family told him not to call them anymore because they made salado janazah for him.
		
00:48:08 --> 00:48:12
			So but hamdulillah I was blessed with an easy transition.
		
00:48:16 --> 00:48:24
			Do you have any particular advice for us to stand in the in the right path that we choose right now
that
		
00:48:26 --> 00:48:45
			for us that he drug can could make us down? You know, like, like I said before, like economic
problems like family problems, like even some of us have, have a really bad situation with the with
our wives, when we do eat or when we grew our beard, like something like that? Do you have any tips
for that?
		
00:48:48 --> 00:48:57
			Well, I would just say that whatever tests that you face, are set by a law
		
00:48:58 --> 00:49:37
			to develop your faith that you become stronger. A law told us like you can live long enough son in
law was Aha, that nobody is burdened with a test to great for him or her to handle. So just keep in
mind that whatever you face is within your ability to handle and when you handle it, you'll become a
better person. So it Allah has chosen these tests to bring out the best in you.
		
00:49:38 --> 00:49:39
			Thank you hamdulillah.
		
00:49:42 --> 00:49:43
			Our
		
00:49:45 --> 00:49:47
			guest here is asking about
		
00:49:48 --> 00:49:51
			the correct understanding of the Trinity
		
00:49:53 --> 00:49:54
			since
		
00:49:55 --> 00:49:59
			from her perspective, it is correct
		
00:50:01 --> 00:50:02
			islamically
		
00:50:04 --> 00:50:13
			Allah is a God is one. And this is what all of the prophets of God taught.
		
00:50:15 --> 00:50:24
			Jesus, even in the gospels, does not refer to three gods.
		
00:50:25 --> 00:50:35
			When he was asked, What is the first commandment here is he repeated the same commandment, which
Moses
		
00:50:38 --> 00:50:55
			taught, here, O Israel, the Lord, your God is one God. So, the whole idea of Trinity is something
which was added to the religion which Jesus brought,
		
00:50:57 --> 00:51:00
			and turned it into another religion.
		
00:51:01 --> 00:51:06
			Jesus taught one God and he worshiped that one God.
		
00:51:08 --> 00:51:13
			The Trinitarian concept say that Jesus was God.
		
00:51:15 --> 00:51:30
			He was the Son of God, and at the same time, he was also God. So, if he was God, then the question
is, who did he pray to?
		
00:51:33 --> 00:51:39
			If he was God, it means he was praying to himself, which is futility, his confusion,
		
00:51:40 --> 00:51:46
			God, Jesus, in all of the text of the New Testament,
		
00:51:48 --> 00:51:50
			the Gospels
		
00:51:51 --> 00:52:13
			considers God to be other than himself. There are many statements that he is supposed to have made
Father, for example, the father is greater than I saw, he's saying that, obviously, he and God are
not one in the same. So
		
00:52:14 --> 00:52:17
			the idea of Trinity My advice to
		
00:52:18 --> 00:52:36
			those Christians who believe in it, it is best for you to research the origin of the concept of
Trinity, because the early followers of Christ did not teach it.
		
00:52:37 --> 00:52:44
			It came about in the fourth century, prior to that, people believed
		
00:52:45 --> 00:52:50
			God was one. And Jesus was a prophet of God,
		
00:52:51 --> 00:52:58
			and the famous Bishop of Alexandria, who upheld that concept.
		
00:52:59 --> 00:54:11
			In the Council of Nicea, where the Trinitarian idea was established, his name is areas, read about
areas, and understand that the Christians have, or the followers of Jesus in the East believed that
he was a prophet of God, and God was one. It was the Romans and the Greeks, who promoted the idea
that Jesus was God. And your common sense, should tell you that if Jesus and God were one in the
same, God's attributes are infinite, and eternal. Jesus's attributes were those of a human being.
God is not born, he was born. God does not die. According to their teachings, he died, Jesus died,
we don't believe he died as Muslims, but according to their teachings, he died.
		
00:54:12 --> 00:54:19
			So these are not the attributes of God. God is without beginning and without, and
		
00:54:21 --> 00:54:25
			my basic advice
		
00:54:27 --> 00:54:30
			for yourselves and for myself
		
00:54:33 --> 00:54:37
			is to seek to understand
		
00:54:39 --> 00:54:40
			the teachings of Islam.
		
00:54:42 --> 00:54:43
			Not merely
		
00:54:44 --> 00:54:45
			to learn
		
00:54:47 --> 00:54:53
			information about Islam, but to actually understand it.
		
00:54:54 --> 00:54:59
			As we read Quran in Ramadan, for example,
		
00:55:00 --> 00:55:07
			We read Quran with the intention of trying to complete the reading of the whole Quran in Ramadan.
		
00:55:08 --> 00:55:12
			But that wasn't the goal of the reading of
		
00:55:14 --> 00:55:35
			the goal of reading the Quran in Ramadan is to hear and understand the words of a law and to try to
put it in our lives. So better for you, if all you can do is to read Surah Al Baqarah.
		
00:55:36 --> 00:55:41
			And read it along with the tafsir
		
00:55:42 --> 00:55:56
			Translation tafsir and you have understood that in Ramadan, that is better for you than to have read
the whole Quran and understood nothing.
		
00:55:57 --> 00:56:11
			So we have to make priorities in our application of Islam, the key is understanding so whether it is
Salah,
		
00:56:12 --> 00:56:15
			reflecting on the purpose of Salah,
		
00:56:16 --> 00:56:18
			not just the ritual of Salah.
		
00:56:19 --> 00:56:30
			But what is the law supposed to do? It is supposed to change our character in the fallout tanha and
in fact Shai will Moncure
		
00:56:31 --> 00:56:36
			Salah prevents us from evil speech and evil deeds.
		
00:56:37 --> 00:56:48
			If it's not preventing us from evil speech and evil deeds, then the Salah that we're doing is not
the Salah, which Allah prescribed.
		
00:56:49 --> 00:57:10
			Were doing rituals, and the Salah is a system for change. It's different from what we're doing. So
we need to treat all of our Islam that way to understand what the goals of the pillars and the
principles of Islam are and to seek to achieve those goals.
		
00:57:11 --> 00:57:34
			I pray that Allah gives us the understanding of the deen. As the prophet SAW Selim had said, My URI
de la will be here Hi, Ron. If a dean whoever a law wishes good. He gives them the deep
understanding of the dean
		
00:57:36 --> 00:57:48
			Subhana Coloma ambica, Masha Allah Allah Allah and not stop Foucault and a tuber Lake, Manitoba
Lake, Manitoba Lake, Manitoba Lake, Manitoba.