Ingrid Mattson – Muslims in PA

Ingrid Mattson
AI: Summary ©
The speakers discuss the importance of praying, finding the right place, and being a Muslim in public. They also talk about the difficulties of practicing Islam, including the need for proactive response, flexibility in dressing, and the importance of learning to be a Muslim. The speakers emphasize the importance of learning about religion in politics and political involvement, and stress the potential for political parties to control the political system. They also discuss the danger of ignoring religious elements and the potential for political involvement.
AI: Transcript ©
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Good evening, and welcome to tonight's lobby talk

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on Muslims in Pennsylvania.

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My name is Jonathan Brokup, associate professor of

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religious studies and history here at Penn State,

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and I'm a specialist on Islamic law and

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comparative ethics.

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Before I ask our panelists to introduce themselves,

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I want to thank all of you for

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coming to this event.

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We are very much looking forward to, answering

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your questions and having a conversation with you

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on this important topic, and I'm very pleased

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to see so many of you here.

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It's not easy to talk about one's faith

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in public,

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particularly when you belong to a minority religious

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tradition.

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Some Muslims,

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have been here for generations.

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Others are new immigrants.

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Many are converts.

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And altogether, there are somewhere between 4 and

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6000000 Muslims in the United States today.

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In all cases, they enjoy the religious freedom

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that's guaranteed to all of us by our

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constitution,

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yet they also face prejudice

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and even fear

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on a daily basis.

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Therefore, I'm particularly grateful

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to our panelists,

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Saqibha

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Khan, Mumina Kowalski,

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Abdullah Yavas,

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and Jordan Lane

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for coming and joining us tonight and agreeing

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to talk about their experiences.

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I'm going to ask each one of them

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to introduce themselves first,

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then we'll have a little conversation among us.

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And then,

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about 20 minutes in, I'll be turning to

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you, and we'll be inviting your questions and

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comments.

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So first of all, Saqibha Khan, would you

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please introduce yourself to the audience?

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Well, hi. I'm Sakba

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Khan. I'm a senior at State High.

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Well, I've been living in State College for

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a year. I moved last year from a

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small town called Du Bois.

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If most of you have heard of that

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town. I was the only

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Muslim well, one of the only Muslim families

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living in Du Bois at that time.

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And after I moved, I realized how diverse

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State College is,

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and compared to Du Bois at least.

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And my parents are originally from Bangladesh.

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Though I was born and brought up in

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America,

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we go to Bangladesh

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every summer, and I love the culture there.

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Thank you.

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My name is Momena Kowalski

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and I have been a resident of State

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College for

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the past 27 years.

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I am a lifelong

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Pennsylvania resident. I grew up in Pittsburgh

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and I I'm a convert

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to Islam. I converted

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in 1978,

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So I have really been a Muslim,

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actually

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several years longer than I have been.

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I was born and catechized in the in

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the Lutheran church,

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so,

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I've reached that critical juncture of my life

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where the,

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the majority of years I've lived as a

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Muslim.

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I, went to

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school in, as I said, Pittsburgh.

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I went to a women's college called Chatham

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College

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in the seventies,

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which

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might say something to those of you who

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know about

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women's colleges in the seventies

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or,

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pretty much education was a feminist

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education

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and

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I studied art, so

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my whole outlook is

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was about creativity

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and also about critical thinking, which is something

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that my teachers gave me there.

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And so, many people, including my family, were

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quite surprised when in 1978,

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I I declared,

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my,

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interest and my conversion to Islam,

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But I haven't looked back and I have

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no regrets.

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I've raised 5 children in Islam. I am

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married and,

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living in Center County and,

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currently I'm studying again now, a master's degree

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with the Hartford Seminary. Ingrid Matson is my

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advisor,

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and I'm getting a degree in Islamic Studies

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and Muslim Christian Relations.

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So I'm enjoying that very much. I'm also,

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on

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the rotation

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of the clergy column in the center daily

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times.

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So

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my idea is to try to present

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Islam

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to Center County,

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Center Daily Times readers

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in small bits with an American twist.

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Abdul?

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Hello. I'm, Abdul Hayavas. I'm currently a professor

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of business administration here at Penn State.

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I was born in a little village in

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Turkey.

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In case you couldn't tell from my accent,

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I'm the only one who wasn't born in

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United States in this town.

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Then moved here after

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finishing,

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undergraduate studies in Istanbul.

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Moved to Iowa City, Iowa where I did

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my graduate studies

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and that was quite a shock

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going from a 15,000,000 city

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to a city of 50,000,000

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population.

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But I ended up loving Iowa City and

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the cornfields around it and the people were

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incredibly

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very nice.

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Then I moved to Penn State in

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1992. Since then I've been teaching here, doing

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research,

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getting involved in a number of community activities.

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I'm married to,

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Jamile Iwas who's also a faculty member here

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at Penn State, and we have 2 beautiful

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daughters,

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Maryam and Sarah.

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Miriam's 2nd grade, and Sarah is 4a half

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years old.

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I'm Jordan Lane.

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I've been

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a Muslim for 4 years now, as of

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September,

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and,

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I'm a student in the College of Education,

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I'm super senior

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and,

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I'm actually waiting to finish my thesis. I'm

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doing pre service teachers' attitudes about Islam,

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that's in progress.

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And,

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there's not much to say except that I

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grew up here, I've spent my entire life

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in,

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the vicinity of State College and,

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Yeah. I'm fully American, I'm fully Muslim.

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That's about it for now.

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Well, we had have had quite a bit

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of, conversation

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among the 5 of us, and I've had

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the pleasure of knowing, actually, all the panelists,

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in different sorts of ways in the past

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couple of years.

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One of the things we were talking about

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is the fact that

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we speak of the Abrahamic traditions, Judaism, Christianity,

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and Islam. And indeed, Islam seems so similar

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to, Christian daily practice.

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Muslims pray,

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they give alms, there is a foundation of

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charity and caring for others.

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But as we were talking,

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in fact, the

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daily practice of prayer

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is quite different

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in Islam than it is in the Christian

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tradition.

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And in fact,

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Jordan was sharing that this was a particular

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difficulty for her when she converted.

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One of the things that I want to

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start with in our conversation

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is some of these daily life aspects

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of how Islam is lived out,

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and what are some of the issues that

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Muslims face in Center County as they try

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to live out their Islam?

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So I invite any of you to respond

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to that. Jordan, if you care to tell

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the story, that would be delightful.

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As I was just telling Doctor. Bracco, one

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of the most difficult,

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parts of adjusting to Muslim life is the

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ritual prayer. When I first converted,

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I knew a lot about Islam when it

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came to the basics, when it came to

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the belief, what we call,

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but,

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not so much the practice. I really didn't

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know what the intricacies of daily life meant

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and I thought to myself,

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oh, 5 times a day. I pray all

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the time. That's nothing.

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But what people don't realize when they're,

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entering Islam is that we have different types

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of prayer.

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The types of prayer that,

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Christians do, like daily remembrance of God as

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you're as you're, say, driving your car

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or or you,

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invoke God's name before you eat or something

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like that.

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That is that is pretty common to religious

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Christians, but,

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what we have no concept of in Christianity,

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but we do have in Islam,

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is ritual prayer, which requires a specific type

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of,

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washing, where you have to wash your hands

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and your face and everything

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before you do it. You have to wear,

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specific type of clothing,

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and there are certain movements you have to

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do, not to mention that all of the

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prayers are in Arabic.

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So if you don't speak Arabic,

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which I had a very, very rudimentary knowledge

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of it entering,

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It's really difficult. You have to memorize everything,

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and

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that's before you can even

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go through a day. You have to do

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that 5 times a day, from the second

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you accept Islam as your faith. So it's

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really sort of overwhelming but thank God it

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it's gotten significantly easier over time for me.

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I think, yeah, it's it's

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overwhelming, but I I hope that people don't

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get the idea that it's something

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insurmountable

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because

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really it's a 7 line prayer.

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And if you have it on a piece

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of paper and said it 5 times a

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day, you're gonna learn it about a week.

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So it's not insurmountable and really when we

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talk about ritual

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prayer or formal prayer,

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the formalities in Islam are very small, really,

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compared

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to, say, liturgical formalities in a church.

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Say for instance, if you were studying

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to become a pastor or a priest, you

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would have to learn a lot of formal

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things, where in Islam,

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actually the practitioner,

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every practitioner

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learns the prayer,

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does the fasting,

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pays the charity,

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and so it's it's it's more of a,

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to me, an egalitarian

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idea.

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But one of the difficulties,

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it seems to me, is precisely finding

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the place to do the ritual washing, finding

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the right place to to pray. Right. Not

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to mention being allowed to take off for

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a few minutes so that you can go

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back and pray. I recall living in Cairo.

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You know, I'd be in a bookstore, and

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suddenly, the guy I was talking to disappears

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for 5 minutes. And I realized that, oh,

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he just went to the back to to

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do his prayer. Exactly. And it's completely accepted.

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But, you know, if you do the same

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thing in Walmart,

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as we know,

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it can be very difficult to get permission

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to have time off. Mhmm. I would like

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to add that prayer was not meant to

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be a difficult task. I mean, that was

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not God's intention.

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It was meant to be a way to

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devote yourself to God. And so, I mean,

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if you can't in circumstances where you can't

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find water to do the ablution or you

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can't find a place, I mean, then you

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can just make your own place, and you

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don't

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have to do the normal washing of the

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face and hand. I mean, there are circumstances

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where God wants to make it easiest for

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us.

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We do have

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a busier

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daily life schedule here too, which,

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sometimes

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makes it harder to find the time because

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prayers

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need to be done at certain time intervals.

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But on the other hand,

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praying

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is more rewarding in a busy schedule like

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that because you can get overwhelmed and and

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and just

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let the whole day go by without remembrance

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of God. And prayer sort of force you

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to take off a few minutes,

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reconnect,

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and then go back to your busy schedule

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again.

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So in that sense,

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it's more

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rewarding or more

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enriching,

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to be able to do the prayers in

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a in a busy schedule like this. Right.

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Now ritual prayer that we're talking about, the

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requirement to pray 5 times a day,

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the first one, by the way, for those

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of you who don't know, is,

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at the very moment of dawn. So it's

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it comes pretty early.

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And

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then

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this, though, is not the only kind of

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prayer

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in the Islamic tradition. Right? There are are

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other kinds of prayer. Can you tell us

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a little bit about those sorts of prayer

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and when they're

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done and and

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how, in fact, they differ a little bit

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from things we might be familiar with?

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Well, like I said, the 2 types of

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prayer that are pretty similar to what religious

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Christians do, there's, Dua, which is like,

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it's called a supplication

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to God, where you ask God,

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for something. For whether it's something spiritual or

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something in the earth.

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Just asking God to help you with something,

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anything you need in your life, and also,

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which is,

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remembrance, like,

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it's

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just basically

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praising God, thinking about the qualities,

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of God that we know, the the such

00:14:08 --> 00:14:10

as the names of Allah, the names of

00:14:10 --> 00:14:11

Allah,

00:14:13 --> 00:14:14

to bring us closer to God and you

00:14:14 --> 00:14:15

can do that at any time.

00:14:16 --> 00:14:17

It's It's spontaneous.

00:14:18 --> 00:14:20

Yes. You know, oh God, help me with

00:14:20 --> 00:14:21

my homework or

00:14:22 --> 00:14:24

don't let me eat that piece of chocolate

00:14:24 --> 00:14:24

cake, or,

00:14:26 --> 00:14:29

anything as simple or as, you know, grand

00:14:29 --> 00:14:31

as you want to be. I mean that

00:14:31 --> 00:14:31

is basically

00:14:32 --> 00:14:35

Dua, and you see with Muslims they raise

00:14:35 --> 00:14:36

their hands this way whereas,

00:14:36 --> 00:14:37

you know,

00:14:38 --> 00:14:40

these are so similar. I mean, it's only

00:14:40 --> 00:14:41

a, you know,

00:14:41 --> 00:14:43

change of position, slight.

00:14:44 --> 00:14:45

I know that when I'm stressed out with

00:14:45 --> 00:14:48

all these exams in school, I just take

00:14:48 --> 00:14:50

2 minutes and say a prayer and it

00:14:50 --> 00:14:51

just makes me feel a lot better, a

00:14:51 --> 00:14:53

lot more confident about myself.

00:14:55 --> 00:14:56

Now the ritual prayer, as you said, is

00:14:56 --> 00:14:58

in Arabic, but the dua,

00:14:58 --> 00:15:01

then you would say in English. Right? Mhmm.

00:15:01 --> 00:15:03

In your own language or Any language that

00:15:03 --> 00:15:04

you speak. Right.

00:15:05 --> 00:15:07

So it's more of a personal connection in

00:15:07 --> 00:15:08

that way.

00:15:10 --> 00:15:13

I wanted to talk also a little bit

00:15:13 --> 00:15:13

about,

00:15:14 --> 00:15:14

911

00:15:15 --> 00:15:17

and and what it's like to to be

00:15:17 --> 00:15:20

a Muslim after that moment in time. Now,

00:15:20 --> 00:15:21

Sakiba, you were

00:15:22 --> 00:15:22

13?

00:15:23 --> 00:15:25

Yes. 13 or 14. I was in 7th

00:15:25 --> 00:15:27

grade, and most people did not know what

00:15:27 --> 00:15:29

a Muslim was until 9:11.

00:15:30 --> 00:15:31

And so when they would hear it on

00:15:31 --> 00:15:32

television constantly,

00:15:33 --> 00:15:36

they started asking me innocently asking me questions

00:15:36 --> 00:15:38

about it, Questions about Islam, like,

00:15:39 --> 00:15:42

do you guys follow polygamy and questions like

00:15:42 --> 00:15:44

that. And so it gave me a really

00:15:44 --> 00:15:46

good opportunity to get the name out, to

00:15:46 --> 00:15:48

get Islam out and what it means to

00:15:49 --> 00:15:50

me. Were you comfortable with that role or

00:15:50 --> 00:15:53

was it a difficult time for you? Actually,

00:15:53 --> 00:15:55

I was very comfortable with that role. Initially,

00:15:56 --> 00:15:58

I was just, like, hesitant on what they

00:15:58 --> 00:16:00

think of Islam, and I didn't want them

00:16:00 --> 00:16:03

to think of it as a terroristic religion.

00:16:03 --> 00:16:05

So, I mean, getting that word out, I

00:16:05 --> 00:16:07

thought that it was a very important thing

00:16:07 --> 00:16:09

for me as a Muslim to do. Mhmm.

00:16:09 --> 00:16:11

It's amazing that you were comfortable with that

00:16:11 --> 00:16:13

role at the age of 13. I mean,

00:16:13 --> 00:16:15

that's a lot to ask of a child

00:16:15 --> 00:16:16

of 13 and

00:16:17 --> 00:16:19

and really it was, you know, a lot

00:16:19 --> 00:16:21

of stress. I I believe in a lot

00:16:21 --> 00:16:23

of families. I have 5 children and,

00:16:24 --> 00:16:26

you know, these these were times that were

00:16:26 --> 00:16:27

difficult for us

00:16:27 --> 00:16:29

so that we, you know, and I was

00:16:29 --> 00:16:31

very concerned about my children

00:16:32 --> 00:16:34

at that time that they be able to,

00:16:35 --> 00:16:36

feel comfortable

00:16:36 --> 00:16:38

in the public space. And,

00:16:39 --> 00:16:41

in many ways in State College, we were

00:16:41 --> 00:16:43

very comfortable. We were made to feel

00:16:44 --> 00:16:47

okay by this community and it was

00:16:47 --> 00:16:49

it was wonderful. Our our

00:16:50 --> 00:16:52

our mosque, our masjid received a lot of

00:16:52 --> 00:16:54

calls of of support

00:16:55 --> 00:16:56

and concern

00:16:56 --> 00:16:59

for our safety and, we were very active

00:17:00 --> 00:17:01

trying

00:17:01 --> 00:17:05

to, we we organized an open house immediately.

00:17:05 --> 00:17:07

Myself and other families

00:17:08 --> 00:17:09

felt

00:17:09 --> 00:17:11

immediately that we needed to open

00:17:12 --> 00:17:12

our,

00:17:13 --> 00:17:16

place of worship up so that people could,

00:17:16 --> 00:17:19

you know, feel comfortable with us.

00:17:19 --> 00:17:21

And but at the same time,

00:17:21 --> 00:17:22

you know,

00:17:23 --> 00:17:25

there were just so many issues that we

00:17:25 --> 00:17:26

had to to deal with personally,

00:17:27 --> 00:17:28

and,

00:17:29 --> 00:17:29

many people

00:17:30 --> 00:17:32

for the first time, you know, started to

00:17:33 --> 00:17:34

leer at us openly.

00:17:35 --> 00:17:37

My sons, in particular, were very protective

00:17:38 --> 00:17:40

of me. They I have become used to

00:17:40 --> 00:17:43

people staring at me with the scarf, and

00:17:43 --> 00:17:45

I almost like a horse with blinders. I

00:17:45 --> 00:17:46

go through my daily,

00:17:48 --> 00:17:51

shopping trips or wherever I'm doing. But, my

00:17:51 --> 00:17:52

sons, if they were with me, they would

00:17:52 --> 00:17:53

be very upset

00:17:54 --> 00:17:55

when people would look at us with a

00:17:55 --> 00:17:57

hard look and want to, you know,

00:17:58 --> 00:18:01

defend me from these types of,

00:18:02 --> 00:18:02

aggression.

00:18:03 --> 00:18:05

I guess living in a small town of

00:18:05 --> 00:18:08

Du Bois where, I mean, living there for

00:18:08 --> 00:18:09

the past 13 years, when I was 13

00:18:09 --> 00:18:12

years old, 9:11 happened. Living there for so

00:18:12 --> 00:18:14

long and knowing so many people in that

00:18:14 --> 00:18:16

town, I just never had to face

00:18:16 --> 00:18:17

criticism.

00:18:17 --> 00:18:20

So that also made me very comfortable to

00:18:20 --> 00:18:21

talk openly about my religion.

00:18:23 --> 00:18:26

You also were mentioning the other day, Abdullah,

00:18:26 --> 00:18:28

that, you felt you had a lot of

00:18:28 --> 00:18:30

support here, in State College from Yeah. It

00:18:30 --> 00:18:33

was a very emotional day. On one hand,

00:18:33 --> 00:18:34

there was this tragic,

00:18:35 --> 00:18:38

horrific event that killed so many innocent people.

00:18:39 --> 00:18:39

And

00:18:40 --> 00:18:42

at the same time, it brought up the

00:18:42 --> 00:18:43

best in

00:18:43 --> 00:18:45

amongst some of some of the,

00:18:45 --> 00:18:47

members of of State College.

00:18:48 --> 00:18:49

I I got I still gave them. I

00:18:49 --> 00:18:52

got a lot of telephone calls, letters,

00:18:53 --> 00:18:54

some of them

00:18:55 --> 00:18:56

towards,

00:18:56 --> 00:18:58

addressed to me. Some of them

00:18:58 --> 00:19:00

asking me if I knew any students,

00:19:01 --> 00:19:03

who might need protection,

00:19:03 --> 00:19:05

that they would open their homes to these

00:19:05 --> 00:19:06

students.

00:19:07 --> 00:19:08

My dean came down

00:19:08 --> 00:19:11

downstairs to my office to see how I

00:19:11 --> 00:19:13

was doing, my colleagues were concerned.

00:19:14 --> 00:19:15

So it was

00:19:15 --> 00:19:17

very emotional on on both levels.

00:19:22 --> 00:19:25

And Jordan, you converted to Islam then after

00:19:25 --> 00:19:25

911.

00:19:26 --> 00:19:28

Yeah. Actually What was the connection? Sort of

00:19:28 --> 00:19:30

funny. I actually had been studying Islam for

00:19:30 --> 00:19:32

about 3 years at that point.

00:19:32 --> 00:19:34

I was a senior in high school when

00:19:34 --> 00:19:35

9 11 happened.

00:19:35 --> 00:19:36

And, I

00:19:37 --> 00:19:39

bought the Quran when I was 15.

00:19:40 --> 00:19:42

And, I didn't actually

00:19:42 --> 00:19:45

get into reading it, which is another story,

00:19:45 --> 00:19:47

until I was about 16, but I was

00:19:47 --> 00:19:48

studying Islam,

00:19:49 --> 00:19:51

through other sources reading about it, Karen Armstrong,

00:19:51 --> 00:19:52

etcetera, that,

00:19:53 --> 00:19:55

books and things like that. But I didn't

00:19:55 --> 00:19:56

know any Muslims.

00:19:57 --> 00:19:58

At the same time,

00:19:58 --> 00:20:00

that was around the time when I was

00:20:00 --> 00:20:02

starting to realize that I was, in fact,

00:20:02 --> 00:20:02

Muslim.

00:20:04 --> 00:20:06

But I didn't convert until my freshman year

00:20:07 --> 00:20:09

of college, which is a year after that.

00:20:09 --> 00:20:11

But at any rate, everyone, all of my

00:20:11 --> 00:20:13

friends, because I did go to a very

00:20:13 --> 00:20:15

small school and my graduating class was 84

00:20:15 --> 00:20:15

people.

00:20:16 --> 00:20:18

Everyone knew me, everyone knew I was interested

00:20:18 --> 00:20:20

in Islam and everyone sort of saw me

00:20:20 --> 00:20:21

as the representative

00:20:22 --> 00:20:23

and asked me all of the questions even

00:20:23 --> 00:20:26

though I wasn't Muslim yet. So, when it

00:20:26 --> 00:20:30

happened, I thought to myself, oh, no. Please

00:20:30 --> 00:20:33

don't let it be Muslim. And of course,

00:20:33 --> 00:20:37

my worst fears were realized and so every

00:20:37 --> 00:20:38

day for all of my senior year I

00:20:38 --> 00:20:39

had to

00:20:39 --> 00:20:42

answer questions like, well,

00:20:42 --> 00:20:45

why did they blow up innocent people? Why

00:20:45 --> 00:20:46

do they hate us? Why,

00:20:48 --> 00:20:50

why America? What did we ever do to

00:20:50 --> 00:20:52

them? And listen to things

00:20:52 --> 00:20:55

like, oh, we should just nuke the whole

00:20:55 --> 00:20:56

Middle East.

00:20:56 --> 00:20:58

All that, so I found myself,

00:20:59 --> 00:21:00

on the defensive,

00:21:00 --> 00:21:03

even though at that time I wasn't technically

00:21:03 --> 00:21:05

Muslim yet. So Yeah. That question,

00:21:06 --> 00:21:08

why do they hate us,

00:21:08 --> 00:21:11

is particularly strange for all of you here,

00:21:11 --> 00:21:14

I would think. Right? Because in a sense,

00:21:14 --> 00:21:15

you're both

00:21:15 --> 00:21:17

they and us. Who is they and who

00:21:17 --> 00:21:20

are us? Exactly. So that raises those questions.

00:21:21 --> 00:21:22

You get an idea, I think, all of

00:21:22 --> 00:21:24

you out in the audience, of the types

00:21:24 --> 00:21:27

of things that, we'd be very happy to

00:21:27 --> 00:21:27

entertain.

00:21:28 --> 00:21:30

Now it's time that I want to,

00:21:31 --> 00:21:34

turn to you and invite your questions and

00:21:34 --> 00:21:35

and your comments.

00:21:36 --> 00:21:38

Anything at all that,

00:21:38 --> 00:21:41

that you'd like to ask this terrific group

00:21:41 --> 00:21:43

of panelists that we have up here this

00:21:43 --> 00:21:43

evening?

00:21:51 --> 00:21:53

I have a question. You were talking earlier

00:21:53 --> 00:21:54

about the prayer,

00:21:55 --> 00:21:56

and it has to do with the workplace.

00:21:56 --> 00:21:58

I happen to be a retired anesthesiologist,

00:21:59 --> 00:22:01

and I'm in the operating room from 7

00:22:01 --> 00:22:02

in the morning till 5 at night. Mhmm.

00:22:02 --> 00:22:05

And, I barely have time to get lunch.

00:22:05 --> 00:22:07

Now how do my colleagues who,

00:22:08 --> 00:22:10

have to pray how do they how do

00:22:10 --> 00:22:11

they manage that?

00:22:12 --> 00:22:13

Thank you very much.

00:22:16 --> 00:22:18

Well, I I don't know. Like, I

00:22:19 --> 00:22:21

going being a high school student and going

00:22:21 --> 00:22:24

to school from 6 in the morning to

00:22:24 --> 00:22:26

2 and then having clubs afterwards, it's not

00:22:26 --> 00:22:28

always easy to pray on time,

00:22:29 --> 00:22:30

but as I said earlier,

00:22:31 --> 00:22:33

God does make exceptions for those cases where

00:22:33 --> 00:22:36

you absolutely can't take the that 5 minutes

00:22:36 --> 00:22:38

off to pray and so you can do

00:22:38 --> 00:22:40

it later in the night when you go

00:22:40 --> 00:22:42

home. I mean, it's better to pray than

00:22:42 --> 00:22:43

not to pray at all.

00:22:44 --> 00:22:47

The the workplace issues are are difficult for

00:22:47 --> 00:22:50

Muslims in America. I think this is something

00:22:50 --> 00:22:50

that,

00:22:52 --> 00:22:53

we

00:22:55 --> 00:22:56

we must, you know,

00:22:57 --> 00:23:00

talk about because, well, I mean, I know

00:23:00 --> 00:23:02

most people get smoking breaks

00:23:02 --> 00:23:04

and I know they get bathroom breaks, so

00:23:05 --> 00:23:07

if a person is going to take

00:23:08 --> 00:23:09

a 15 minute break,

00:23:10 --> 00:23:11

you know, at at

00:23:11 --> 00:23:13

or with their lunch,

00:23:14 --> 00:23:16

that actually could suffice for

00:23:17 --> 00:23:19

the afternoon prayer. The first prayer is is

00:23:19 --> 00:23:20

the dawn prayer,

00:23:21 --> 00:23:23

which if you're in home in your home,

00:23:23 --> 00:23:26

unless you're, you know, it's it's probably pretty

00:23:26 --> 00:23:28

easy to accomplish that unless you're on night

00:23:28 --> 00:23:29

shift,

00:23:30 --> 00:23:32

but all of the prayer times are have

00:23:32 --> 00:23:33

a window of time.

00:23:34 --> 00:23:36

So there's a beginning time and an end

00:23:36 --> 00:23:40

time for those particular prayers and that's around

00:23:40 --> 00:23:43

the whole 24 hour clock. If you aren't

00:23:43 --> 00:23:45

able to make the prayer in that time,

00:23:45 --> 00:23:47

you can make up your prayer. It's a

00:23:47 --> 00:23:48

late prayer. It's considered

00:23:49 --> 00:23:50

it's considered

00:23:50 --> 00:23:51

not optimal.

00:23:52 --> 00:23:55

The best prayer is the prayer prayed on

00:23:55 --> 00:23:55

time,

00:23:56 --> 00:23:58

but there's always the option to make it

00:23:58 --> 00:24:00

up later. I have to say this is

00:24:00 --> 00:24:02

one of the things that makes

00:24:03 --> 00:24:03

practicing

00:24:04 --> 00:24:07

daily life of of Islam very difficult because

00:24:08 --> 00:24:10

even if you have a an an employer

00:24:10 --> 00:24:12

who's willing to do this, you still have

00:24:12 --> 00:24:14

to ask for it. Right. You have to

00:24:14 --> 00:24:16

put yourself out there. You have to say,

00:24:16 --> 00:24:19

I need this time, I need this space,

00:24:19 --> 00:24:21

I need a place where I can wash.

00:24:21 --> 00:24:24

And depending on your position, if you're very

00:24:24 --> 00:24:26

high up in the hospital and you have

00:24:26 --> 00:24:27

the clout, then you can ask

00:24:28 --> 00:24:31

for that. If you're some low ranking, newly

00:24:31 --> 00:24:32

hired person,

00:24:32 --> 00:24:34

that may be very difficult to request.

00:24:35 --> 00:24:37

And I think it's important for us to

00:24:37 --> 00:24:39

remember just how difficult these sorts of things

00:24:39 --> 00:24:41

have to be. They require, in some sense,

00:24:41 --> 00:24:42

proactive

00:24:42 --> 00:24:43

response

00:24:43 --> 00:24:45

on the part of those of us who

00:24:45 --> 00:24:46

are not Muslim.

00:24:46 --> 00:24:48

Right. Thank you very much. Are there other

00:24:48 --> 00:24:49

questions?

00:24:50 --> 00:24:52

This is for the, for the converts. I

00:24:52 --> 00:24:55

was curious, for someone born into the tradition,

00:24:55 --> 00:24:56

the dress seems,

00:24:57 --> 00:24:58

more regular or something you would be used

00:24:59 --> 00:25:00

to. Why did you decide to go with

00:25:00 --> 00:25:02

a traditional or conservative

00:25:02 --> 00:25:03

approach to your dress?

00:25:06 --> 00:25:07

Do you wanna take that, Jordan?

00:25:09 --> 00:25:09

I can.

00:25:11 --> 00:25:12

I actually had a lot of trouble with

00:25:12 --> 00:25:15

it. Not at first. I not personally, but

00:25:15 --> 00:25:18

more with my family. My mother said exactly

00:25:18 --> 00:25:20

what you said. She said, I I understand

00:25:20 --> 00:25:22

why your friends wear it. It it makes

00:25:22 --> 00:25:25

sense. It's their culture. But I don't understand

00:25:25 --> 00:25:26

why you wear it. Do you have to

00:25:26 --> 00:25:28

wear it? And then she begs me, can

00:25:28 --> 00:25:29

you tie it in the back? Can you,

00:25:29 --> 00:25:31

you know, can you look a little bit

00:25:31 --> 00:25:33

more American? Can you wear earrings?

00:25:33 --> 00:25:34

And

00:25:35 --> 00:25:36

these are things that, to me, I think

00:25:36 --> 00:25:37

are silly.

00:25:37 --> 00:25:39

Sometimes I do accommodate for her, and I'll

00:25:39 --> 00:25:41

tie it in the back just to make

00:25:41 --> 00:25:43

it a little easier on her because she's

00:25:43 --> 00:25:45

been very understanding about the whole thing.

00:25:46 --> 00:25:47

But what it comes down to is that

00:25:47 --> 00:25:49

I personally believe it's required.

00:25:50 --> 00:25:51

And I also think that

00:25:52 --> 00:25:53

even if it weren't required,

00:25:54 --> 00:25:56

it's a part of you. It it makes

00:25:56 --> 00:25:57

you feel,

00:25:59 --> 00:26:00

it reminds you of who you are,

00:26:01 --> 00:26:03

it tells other people who you are,

00:26:04 --> 00:26:07

in many ways it sort of

00:26:07 --> 00:26:09

gives people an idea of how to treat

00:26:09 --> 00:26:12

you and sometimes that's bad and most of

00:26:12 --> 00:26:13

the time that's good.

00:26:13 --> 00:26:13

And,

00:26:14 --> 00:26:15

it puts the emphasis

00:26:17 --> 00:26:19

on something other than

00:26:19 --> 00:26:20

your physical

00:26:20 --> 00:26:21

appearance?

00:26:22 --> 00:26:22

You know, it's the most,

00:26:23 --> 00:26:24

visible

00:26:24 --> 00:26:26

sign of a Muslim, but it's not the

00:26:26 --> 00:26:27

most important thing.

00:26:27 --> 00:26:28

I mean, the beliefs

00:26:29 --> 00:26:30

and the practices

00:26:31 --> 00:26:31

are

00:26:32 --> 00:26:33

varied and

00:26:33 --> 00:26:34

and diverse and,

00:26:36 --> 00:26:38

you know, this is something that

00:26:39 --> 00:26:39

represents,

00:26:42 --> 00:26:44

your point of view and your your belief,

00:26:45 --> 00:26:47

and I I also feel it's important. I've

00:26:47 --> 00:26:49

I've been wearing the hijab for

00:26:50 --> 00:26:51

as long as I've been a Muslim, but

00:26:52 --> 00:26:52

and

00:26:53 --> 00:26:54

I mean, I can say just from my

00:26:54 --> 00:26:55

own,

00:26:56 --> 00:26:58

point of view that it does

00:26:59 --> 00:27:01

affect the way people treat you.

00:27:02 --> 00:27:03

I come from

00:27:04 --> 00:27:07

white Anglo Saxon Protestant background, so I was

00:27:07 --> 00:27:08

the majority culture.

00:27:09 --> 00:27:11

I came into the minority culture in a

00:27:11 --> 00:27:11

way

00:27:12 --> 00:27:13

by putting on hijab.

00:27:14 --> 00:27:16

So, you know, it's interesting

00:27:17 --> 00:27:19

how people then treat you differently.

00:27:20 --> 00:27:22

So, you know, it's almost like that book

00:27:22 --> 00:27:25

Black Like Me. You take on this new

00:27:26 --> 00:27:26

characteristic

00:27:27 --> 00:27:29

and and you it actually is helpful

00:27:30 --> 00:27:32

because the people that don't treat you very

00:27:32 --> 00:27:33

well

00:27:33 --> 00:27:35

probably aren't worth your time.

00:27:35 --> 00:27:36

So it's sort of like a

00:27:38 --> 00:27:40

Like a calling mechanism. Yes. Like a calling

00:27:40 --> 00:27:41

mechanism. Very good.

00:27:41 --> 00:27:44

Very good. No. But there are a wide

00:27:44 --> 00:27:44

variety

00:27:45 --> 00:27:45

of,

00:27:46 --> 00:27:48

of styles of Islamic dress.

00:27:49 --> 00:27:51

There's the the hijab. There's the

00:27:52 --> 00:27:55

face veil. There's the burqa, which is the

00:27:55 --> 00:27:58

complete covering. Right. And these are many of

00:27:58 --> 00:28:01

them located in particular regional and and cultural

00:28:01 --> 00:28:02

spheres. Right.

00:28:03 --> 00:28:05

Did it ever occur to you to put

00:28:05 --> 00:28:07

on the burqa, for example?

00:28:08 --> 00:28:11

No. And and I do actually know. I

00:28:11 --> 00:28:13

do have a friend who used to wear

00:28:13 --> 00:28:15

the niqab, which is the face veil.

00:28:15 --> 00:28:16

She

00:28:16 --> 00:28:19

lived in she lives in Philly

00:28:19 --> 00:28:21

and, a lot of women in Philly choose

00:28:21 --> 00:28:22

to wear the niqab.

00:28:22 --> 00:28:23

And,

00:28:23 --> 00:28:25

she was a

00:28:26 --> 00:28:28

grade school teacher, and so it worked for

00:28:28 --> 00:28:30

her. She could she could take it off

00:28:30 --> 00:28:32

in her classroom, in front of the children

00:28:32 --> 00:28:34

and just deal with them,

00:28:35 --> 00:28:36

in her hijab.

00:28:37 --> 00:28:39

But she found after a while that,

00:28:40 --> 00:28:41

it was very,

00:28:41 --> 00:28:43

difficult for her to interact with society

00:28:44 --> 00:28:46

in the niqab, and she ended up taking

00:28:46 --> 00:28:48

it off, but with the hope that she

00:28:48 --> 00:28:50

could put it on again someday because she

00:28:50 --> 00:28:53

liked wearing it. Thank you. There are a

00:28:53 --> 00:28:55

number of other questions. Yes, please.

00:28:56 --> 00:28:59

I've always wondered, not always, but in recent

00:28:59 --> 00:29:01

years, why it is that we emphasize so

00:29:01 --> 00:29:04

much what women wear in Islam and not

00:29:04 --> 00:29:05

what men wear?

00:29:05 --> 00:29:06

That's good

00:29:06 --> 00:29:07

news. Abdallah?

00:29:11 --> 00:29:13

No. Men's supposed to

00:29:14 --> 00:29:16

wear modest clothes,

00:29:17 --> 00:29:18

not revealing

00:29:18 --> 00:29:20

or not too tight.

00:29:20 --> 00:29:23

So there is a dress code for for

00:29:23 --> 00:29:24

men as well.

00:29:24 --> 00:29:26

But, I guess,

00:29:27 --> 00:29:29

it's not as visible or

00:29:29 --> 00:29:32

it doesn't have to be as different as

00:29:32 --> 00:29:34

than what we're used to

00:29:34 --> 00:29:35

seen as

00:29:36 --> 00:29:36

as as headscarf.

00:29:37 --> 00:29:38

But there are specifics.

00:29:39 --> 00:29:39

I mean,

00:29:40 --> 00:29:42

I have to tell the story and embarrass

00:29:42 --> 00:29:42

my cousin.

00:29:43 --> 00:29:45

When he came to Egypt,

00:29:46 --> 00:29:46

one time

00:29:47 --> 00:29:50

and was walking down, the main street right

00:29:50 --> 00:29:52

by the Nile, and it was a sweltering

00:29:52 --> 00:29:53

day in the middle of summer.

00:29:54 --> 00:29:56

And he's just sweating, and so he just

00:29:56 --> 00:29:57

takes his t shirt off.

00:29:58 --> 00:30:00

And it was as if

00:30:00 --> 00:30:04

he was naked. Right. Traffic stop. People are

00:30:04 --> 00:30:04

staring.

00:30:05 --> 00:30:06

It was a scene,

00:30:07 --> 00:30:10

because he had seriously violated

00:30:11 --> 00:30:13

the the dress code for for men. The

00:30:13 --> 00:30:15

fact he was Muslim or not Muslim made

00:30:15 --> 00:30:16

no difference whatsoever.

00:30:16 --> 00:30:20

There's an extremely well known saying that every

00:30:20 --> 00:30:21

religion has its character

00:30:22 --> 00:30:24

and the character of Islam is modesty.

00:30:25 --> 00:30:26

It's a huge

00:30:26 --> 00:30:27

all pervading

00:30:28 --> 00:30:29

statement

00:30:29 --> 00:30:32

which means modesty in the sense of the

00:30:32 --> 00:30:33

physical modesty

00:30:33 --> 00:30:35

but also in in terms of,

00:30:36 --> 00:30:38

you know, being generous and modest,

00:30:39 --> 00:30:41

to people in general and having good manners.

00:30:42 --> 00:30:44

So I think that, yeah,

00:30:44 --> 00:30:46

men taking off their shirts is

00:30:46 --> 00:30:49

in Islamic culture considered immodest

00:30:50 --> 00:30:52

as well as, you know, people wearing shorts,

00:30:52 --> 00:30:54

so, you know, if you are a tourist

00:30:54 --> 00:30:56

in a Muslim country, you should know that

00:30:56 --> 00:30:57

that would be considered offensive.

00:30:58 --> 00:30:59

Yes, please.

00:31:01 --> 00:31:03

I'm very reluctant to bring this up,

00:31:04 --> 00:31:06

but it's something that has bothered me many,

00:31:06 --> 00:31:08

many times and that is,

00:31:09 --> 00:31:12

what does the Koran say about the infidel?

00:31:14 --> 00:31:15

Thank you very much.

00:31:17 --> 00:31:20

Actually, could I ask you a little bit

00:31:20 --> 00:31:20

more,

00:31:21 --> 00:31:23

to to say just a few more words

00:31:23 --> 00:31:26

of what you've heard and We have read,

00:31:26 --> 00:31:27

and I think that,

00:31:28 --> 00:31:29

most of us, I believe

00:31:30 --> 00:31:31

that it's the,

00:31:32 --> 00:31:32

oh,

00:31:33 --> 00:31:35

the other side of your religion

00:31:35 --> 00:31:36

who

00:31:36 --> 00:31:38

says that the Quran says,

00:31:40 --> 00:31:40

shoot him

00:31:41 --> 00:31:42

or do something to him,

00:31:43 --> 00:31:45

but don't let him go. And I can't

00:31:45 --> 00:31:48

believe that. I simply can't believe that. And

00:31:48 --> 00:31:50

I'd like to know what the Koran

00:31:50 --> 00:31:51

really says.

00:31:52 --> 00:31:53

How how do they

00:31:53 --> 00:31:54

encourage

00:31:54 --> 00:31:55

an infidel

00:31:56 --> 00:31:56

to join

00:31:57 --> 00:31:58

the the,

00:31:59 --> 00:32:00

the Muslim religion?

00:32:03 --> 00:32:05

I have to begin by answering historically

00:32:06 --> 00:32:08

that the Quran is

00:32:09 --> 00:32:12

in some ways a unique text because it

00:32:12 --> 00:32:13

came into

00:32:13 --> 00:32:14

a world

00:32:14 --> 00:32:15

of,

00:32:15 --> 00:32:17

religions that were were well known.

00:32:18 --> 00:32:21

In other words, the Quran speaks directly about

00:32:21 --> 00:32:21

Judaism,

00:32:22 --> 00:32:23

directly about Christianity,

00:32:24 --> 00:32:26

as well as about monotheism. So in fact,

00:32:26 --> 00:32:27

as about polytheism,

00:32:28 --> 00:32:31

the Quran has a great deal to say

00:32:31 --> 00:32:33

about other religious traditions.

00:32:33 --> 00:32:35

But I'd really like to turn to the

00:32:35 --> 00:32:38

panelists and hear how you've interpreted these Quran

00:32:38 --> 00:32:40

verses in in your own lives. How you

00:32:40 --> 00:32:41

understand these things.

00:32:42 --> 00:32:44

Well, I think if the danger of interpreting

00:32:45 --> 00:32:48

verses without quoting verses is is very great,

00:32:48 --> 00:32:49

number 1.

00:32:50 --> 00:32:52

I mean, the Quran is available in the

00:32:52 --> 00:32:54

public library. You're welcome to to go and

00:32:54 --> 00:32:56

take it out and and find those verses

00:32:57 --> 00:32:58

and see what

00:32:58 --> 00:33:01

we're talking, what you're talking about because

00:33:01 --> 00:33:02

I'm not clear,

00:33:03 --> 00:33:05

what verse you're referring to. Now,

00:33:06 --> 00:33:07

in terms of infidel,

00:33:08 --> 00:33:11

I'm I'm I'm guessing that you're talking about

00:33:11 --> 00:33:12

the word kafir.

00:33:12 --> 00:33:13

And

00:33:14 --> 00:33:17

you have to remember that the Quran was

00:33:17 --> 00:33:19

revealed in the 7th century in a context,

00:33:20 --> 00:33:22

in a time and place

00:33:22 --> 00:33:25

and it was revealed over a period of

00:33:25 --> 00:33:26

23 years

00:33:27 --> 00:33:27

with,

00:33:28 --> 00:33:30

all kinds of things happening

00:33:30 --> 00:33:31

to the prophet Muhammad,

00:33:32 --> 00:33:33

peace be upon him, at the time that

00:33:33 --> 00:33:35

he was receiving this revelation.

00:33:36 --> 00:33:37

So

00:33:37 --> 00:33:39

verses that are received

00:33:40 --> 00:33:41

in the beginning of the revelation

00:33:42 --> 00:33:44

primarily have to do with

00:33:44 --> 00:33:46

him being this lone,

00:33:48 --> 00:33:48

prophet

00:33:49 --> 00:33:50

receiving a message

00:33:50 --> 00:33:53

in the middle of a well civilized developed

00:33:53 --> 00:33:54

city

00:33:55 --> 00:33:57

of people who were polytheists in a tribal

00:33:58 --> 00:33:58

situation

00:33:59 --> 00:34:00

who were against

00:34:01 --> 00:34:04

him receiving or having this message of

00:34:05 --> 00:34:08

of claiming that there was one God and

00:34:08 --> 00:34:10

this was not their tradition.

00:34:10 --> 00:34:13

So we have that context to think about.

00:34:13 --> 00:34:16

We have also the context of the outside

00:34:16 --> 00:34:17

community

00:34:17 --> 00:34:21

outside of Mecca and even the Arabian Peninsula

00:34:22 --> 00:34:23

being

00:34:23 --> 00:34:25

a large Byzantine Empire,

00:34:27 --> 00:34:29

Jewish community in Medina.

00:34:29 --> 00:34:32

All these places and all of these contexts,

00:34:33 --> 00:34:35

we know when verses were revealed

00:34:36 --> 00:34:38

and in what context they were revealed. So

00:34:39 --> 00:34:40

any scholar of the Quran

00:34:41 --> 00:34:43

is going to bring you that material.

00:34:43 --> 00:34:45

So when you just pluck a verse out,

00:34:46 --> 00:34:48

just as I as I would pluck a

00:34:48 --> 00:34:49

verse out of the old testament,

00:34:50 --> 00:34:52

it would not make sense

00:34:52 --> 00:34:55

in a general sense perhaps or it wouldn't

00:34:55 --> 00:34:56

make sense to

00:34:56 --> 00:34:57

practitioners

00:34:57 --> 00:34:59

today in the 21st century

00:34:59 --> 00:35:00

without the context.

00:35:01 --> 00:35:04

And it's also important to note that,

00:35:05 --> 00:35:06

there's a difference between

00:35:07 --> 00:35:07

what,

00:35:08 --> 00:35:10

I believe you're referring to as infidels. I

00:35:11 --> 00:35:13

I I believe you're seeing that as non

00:35:13 --> 00:35:13

Muslims,

00:35:14 --> 00:35:15

but the Quran distinguishes

00:35:16 --> 00:35:17

between non Muslim

00:35:18 --> 00:35:18

monotheists,

00:35:19 --> 00:35:21

as in Christians and Jews. They're called Ahlul

00:35:21 --> 00:35:23

Kitab, the people of the book. They have

00:35:23 --> 00:35:24

their own revelations,

00:35:25 --> 00:35:28

and they're different from the term that Mutmanay

00:35:28 --> 00:35:28

used,

00:35:29 --> 00:35:30

the kafirun,

00:35:30 --> 00:35:32

which are the disbelievers.

00:35:33 --> 00:35:35

And the disbelievers usually in the Quran are

00:35:35 --> 00:35:36

referring to those

00:35:37 --> 00:35:37

specific

00:35:37 --> 00:35:38

disbelievers

00:35:38 --> 00:35:40

at that time who were

00:35:41 --> 00:35:43

assailing the Muslims, who were,

00:35:44 --> 00:35:45

persecuting them.

00:35:46 --> 00:35:46

So

00:35:47 --> 00:35:50

your interaction with someone in a society like

00:35:51 --> 00:35:52

State College, Pennsylvania

00:35:53 --> 00:35:55

is very different from your interaction

00:35:55 --> 00:35:56

with,

00:35:57 --> 00:35:58

a group

00:35:58 --> 00:35:59

of

00:36:00 --> 00:36:02

polytheists from Mecca

00:36:02 --> 00:36:03

who are trying to kill you and are

00:36:03 --> 00:36:05

trying to take your wealth and are trying

00:36:05 --> 00:36:06

to

00:36:06 --> 00:36:08

to basically wipe your religion off the face

00:36:08 --> 00:36:10

of the earth. It's a different way of

00:36:10 --> 00:36:11

dealing with people.

00:36:12 --> 00:36:13

If I may

00:36:15 --> 00:36:17

quote a verse from the Quran,

00:36:18 --> 00:36:19

where it says, killing

00:36:20 --> 00:36:21

a single person

00:36:21 --> 00:36:25

is like killing entire humanity and saving a

00:36:25 --> 00:36:26

human life is

00:36:26 --> 00:36:28

like saving the entire humanity.

00:36:30 --> 00:36:32

And that's a very well known verse,

00:36:33 --> 00:36:35

doesn't require much interpretation.

00:36:36 --> 00:36:37

And that's

00:36:38 --> 00:36:40

that is the principle for Moses. Killing is

00:36:40 --> 00:36:43

one of the biggest sins one can commit.

00:36:44 --> 00:36:46

Suicide is another one of the biggest sins

00:36:46 --> 00:36:49

one can commit. But because of what happened

00:36:49 --> 00:36:50

on 9eleven

00:36:51 --> 00:36:53

and a few events before and after,

00:36:53 --> 00:36:56

now unfortunately we have this perception that,

00:36:57 --> 00:36:59

where we see these quotations out

00:36:59 --> 00:37:00

of context

00:37:00 --> 00:37:02

and we get this perception that maybe there's

00:37:02 --> 00:37:04

something wrong, something in the religion

00:37:05 --> 00:37:07

that's causing these lands. One of the things

00:37:07 --> 00:37:09

that I often hear,

00:37:09 --> 00:37:12

from people is this fear that,

00:37:13 --> 00:37:15

yes, you know, when when Muslims talk to

00:37:15 --> 00:37:16

non Muslims,

00:37:16 --> 00:37:19

they represent everything as being easy and nice

00:37:19 --> 00:37:20

and friendly.

00:37:21 --> 00:37:23

But when you read the Quran, then you

00:37:23 --> 00:37:25

find out what it's really all about.

00:37:25 --> 00:37:26

And

00:37:26 --> 00:37:28

that's an an easy,

00:37:29 --> 00:37:32

explanation to fall into. And I think the

00:37:32 --> 00:37:34

only way that one can really be convinced

00:37:34 --> 00:37:36

otherwise is precisely to look at history,

00:37:37 --> 00:37:39

to to look at exactly

00:37:39 --> 00:37:42

how Muslims have lived and continue to live

00:37:42 --> 00:37:43

with people of different faiths,

00:37:44 --> 00:37:46

in the variety of Muslim civilizations that are

00:37:46 --> 00:37:49

out there, today. So thank thank you very

00:37:49 --> 00:37:50

much for that question.

00:37:55 --> 00:37:57

I have a quick question to the converts.

00:37:58 --> 00:38:00

What made you change your original,

00:38:00 --> 00:38:04

original religion to Islam? And by the way,

00:38:04 --> 00:38:06

I'm very proud to Lisa a keeper's mom.

00:38:09 --> 00:38:10

I'll I'll

00:38:10 --> 00:38:12

answer quickly because, actually,

00:38:13 --> 00:38:15

I don't think I really did change my

00:38:15 --> 00:38:18

religion in anything other than name.

00:38:19 --> 00:38:19

I'd always

00:38:20 --> 00:38:23

believed what I came to know as Islam.

00:38:23 --> 00:38:26

I didn't know that it existed because I

00:38:26 --> 00:38:27

wasn't taught about Islam.

00:38:28 --> 00:38:29

I actually grew up in an Arab American

00:38:29 --> 00:38:31

family but they were Christian.

00:38:31 --> 00:38:34

So, all I knew was Christianity and you

00:38:34 --> 00:38:36

were either a Christian or an atheist in

00:38:36 --> 00:38:38

my mind. I knew there were other religions,

00:38:38 --> 00:38:39

but

00:38:39 --> 00:38:41

I didn't know much about them.

00:38:41 --> 00:38:44

So, when I started looking into my own,

00:38:44 --> 00:38:46

roots, my Arab roots,

00:38:47 --> 00:38:49

you can't really study that without studying Islam.

00:38:49 --> 00:38:51

So the more I found out about it,

00:38:51 --> 00:38:53

the more I thought, oh, wow, This is

00:38:53 --> 00:38:55

what I already believe. And I didn't know

00:38:55 --> 00:38:55

any Muslims,

00:38:56 --> 00:38:59

until I'd already decided to be Muslim. And

00:38:59 --> 00:39:01

I went to an MSA meeting and

00:39:01 --> 00:39:04

to become Muslim you take your shahada, which

00:39:04 --> 00:39:07

is your declaration of faith. And, I technically

00:39:07 --> 00:39:09

couldn't have even done that in high school

00:39:09 --> 00:39:10

because I didn't know 2 Muslims

00:39:11 --> 00:39:13

to be the witnesses to hear me say

00:39:13 --> 00:39:13

it.

00:39:13 --> 00:39:14

So,

00:39:15 --> 00:39:17

yeah, it really wasn't that difficult of a

00:39:17 --> 00:39:18

change for me

00:39:18 --> 00:39:19

in belief.

00:39:19 --> 00:39:21

I was an art artist and

00:39:22 --> 00:39:24

I was allowed to look at different religions,

00:39:24 --> 00:39:25

you know.

00:39:26 --> 00:39:28

And I was coming of age in the

00:39:28 --> 00:39:31

seventies and status quo was just

00:39:32 --> 00:39:34

all up for you know. Every

00:39:35 --> 00:39:35

everything,

00:39:36 --> 00:39:36

you know, you didn't have to be anything

00:39:36 --> 00:39:36

in particular and and per for me to

00:39:36 --> 00:39:38

choose Islam was, you

00:39:38 --> 00:39:40

know, kind of

00:39:43 --> 00:39:45

different. My father thought I was joining a

00:39:45 --> 00:39:47

cult because, you know, I became a Muslim

00:39:47 --> 00:39:49

during the Iranian revolution

00:39:50 --> 00:39:52

and Jimmy Jim Jones or something was doing

00:39:52 --> 00:39:55

the committing suicide down in Guyana and

00:39:55 --> 00:39:57

all kinds of things were happening. But to

00:39:57 --> 00:39:58

me, intellectually,

00:39:58 --> 00:39:59

the Quran,

00:40:01 --> 00:40:02

grabbed me

00:40:03 --> 00:40:03

and

00:40:04 --> 00:40:07

actually putting on hijab had a huge effect

00:40:07 --> 00:40:09

on me as a woman.

00:40:11 --> 00:40:13

Really, it's just like I you know, separating

00:40:14 --> 00:40:16

the the wheat from the chaff and and,

00:40:18 --> 00:40:20

the practice, the everyday,

00:40:21 --> 00:40:23

the prayer diving into that,

00:40:23 --> 00:40:25

when you when you when you ask God

00:40:25 --> 00:40:28

for guidance, I mean, I I believe God

00:40:28 --> 00:40:29

answers you.

00:40:32 --> 00:40:34

Because I'm in front, I think I won't

00:40:34 --> 00:40:34

stand.

00:40:35 --> 00:40:38

I wanted to ask about those everyday practices.

00:40:38 --> 00:40:41

Nobody said anything yet about the role of

00:40:41 --> 00:40:44

meals, and food, and drink, and I'd love

00:40:44 --> 00:40:45

to hear something about that.

00:40:47 --> 00:40:48

Well, that's actually,

00:40:49 --> 00:40:50

one of the things that my family has

00:40:50 --> 00:40:52

been most supportive about.

00:40:53 --> 00:40:55

First, when I first converted, I didn't eat

00:40:55 --> 00:40:58

halal and for anyone who doesn't understand, halal

00:40:58 --> 00:41:00

is similar to kosher, except that our rules

00:41:00 --> 00:41:02

are not nearly as strict.

00:41:02 --> 00:41:04

It's the way in which the animal has

00:41:04 --> 00:41:05

to be slaughtered.

00:41:05 --> 00:41:07

And, I didn't eat halal, I but I

00:41:07 --> 00:41:09

didn't, of course, eat pork or alcohol.

00:41:11 --> 00:41:14

So my grandmother would be very careful

00:41:14 --> 00:41:17

to cook meals separately if she was cooking

00:41:17 --> 00:41:19

ham or pork or something, she usually didn't

00:41:19 --> 00:41:21

do it when I was there to eat,

00:41:21 --> 00:41:23

but if she did, she'd use different utensils

00:41:23 --> 00:41:24

and and,

00:41:24 --> 00:41:26

make sure it didn't touch the food that

00:41:26 --> 00:41:27

I was eating and things like that. She's

00:41:27 --> 00:41:30

been very very supportive when it comes to

00:41:30 --> 00:41:30

that.

00:41:31 --> 00:41:33

So that really wasn't too difficult, and you

00:41:33 --> 00:41:34

can go to a restaurant and avoid

00:41:35 --> 00:41:37

pork and alcohol pretty easily.

00:41:38 --> 00:41:40

Now that I've started to eat halal, it's

00:41:40 --> 00:41:41

a little more difficult,

00:41:41 --> 00:41:42

because I can eat kosher,

00:41:43 --> 00:41:45

and I can eat fish,

00:41:45 --> 00:41:47

and other than that I really can't eat

00:41:47 --> 00:41:47

meat.

00:41:48 --> 00:41:50

So, it's a little more difficult, but it's

00:41:50 --> 00:41:53

it's available and it's more available in cities.

00:41:53 --> 00:41:55

So, if I were to live in in

00:41:55 --> 00:41:57

D. C. Or Philly it wouldn't be a

00:41:57 --> 00:41:58

problem at all.

00:41:58 --> 00:42:00

Something that I find very important is

00:42:01 --> 00:42:02

before we eat we should always say a

00:42:02 --> 00:42:04

prayer to God to just thank him for

00:42:04 --> 00:42:06

the food. And I know that's same in

00:42:06 --> 00:42:06

Christianity,

00:42:07 --> 00:42:07

Judaism,

00:42:08 --> 00:42:10

just to think of thank God for giving

00:42:10 --> 00:42:11

us that food,

00:42:11 --> 00:42:13

and Muslims really hold on to

00:42:15 --> 00:42:17

that. Yeah I think the the whole issue

00:42:17 --> 00:42:19

of food we usually think of halal versus

00:42:19 --> 00:42:20

haram, you know,

00:42:22 --> 00:42:24

something that is okay versus something that is

00:42:24 --> 00:42:25

forbidden to us,

00:42:26 --> 00:42:28

but there's a saying that everything,

00:42:29 --> 00:42:30

God has permitted

00:42:30 --> 00:42:30

everything

00:42:31 --> 00:42:33

except that which he has been explicitly

00:42:34 --> 00:42:34

prohibited.

00:42:35 --> 00:42:37

So when we think of the vast

00:42:38 --> 00:42:38

amount

00:42:39 --> 00:42:41

of food choices in the world,

00:42:42 --> 00:42:44

think of all the fruits, think of all

00:42:44 --> 00:42:45

the vegetables,

00:42:46 --> 00:42:47

greens, think of all the

00:42:48 --> 00:42:49

just varieties

00:42:49 --> 00:42:51

of wonderful delicious things.

00:42:52 --> 00:42:52

And

00:42:53 --> 00:42:55

only prohibited are certain

00:42:55 --> 00:42:58

meats where the animal has not been

00:42:59 --> 00:43:01

really blessed or or

00:43:01 --> 00:43:02

we haven't really

00:43:03 --> 00:43:04

thought about taking that life

00:43:05 --> 00:43:07

in a, in a substantial way where we

00:43:07 --> 00:43:07

haven't

00:43:08 --> 00:43:10

purified the food or,

00:43:10 --> 00:43:13

you know, we're we're we're mass producing, you

00:43:13 --> 00:43:13

know,

00:43:14 --> 00:43:16

and slaughtering these animals

00:43:17 --> 00:43:18

with with horrible methods.

00:43:19 --> 00:43:22

I mean, this is impacting our health.

00:43:22 --> 00:43:25

This is a lot of Muslim Americans

00:43:25 --> 00:43:28

are more concerned with, you know, organic

00:43:29 --> 00:43:30

foods and

00:43:30 --> 00:43:33

and foods that are pure in a spiritual

00:43:33 --> 00:43:34

sense because,

00:43:34 --> 00:43:36

you know, we're consuming.

00:43:36 --> 00:43:39

We're a consuming nation and we're and we're

00:43:39 --> 00:43:40

really being

00:43:40 --> 00:43:41

consumed

00:43:42 --> 00:43:43

by this this idea.

00:43:45 --> 00:43:46

There are some other aspects of food that

00:43:46 --> 00:43:49

I think are interesting to to bring up.

00:43:50 --> 00:43:52

There is a festival of sacrifice,

00:43:52 --> 00:43:54

for example. Now,

00:43:55 --> 00:43:56

this is celebrated

00:43:56 --> 00:43:58

differently in in different places.

00:43:58 --> 00:43:59

I recall

00:43:59 --> 00:44:02

living in Tunisia where every household

00:44:02 --> 00:44:04

had a had a sheep, basically.

00:44:05 --> 00:44:05

And,

00:44:06 --> 00:44:08

in fact, when we were living there, my

00:44:08 --> 00:44:10

son was 2 years old, and he really

00:44:10 --> 00:44:12

fell in love with the sheep and he

00:44:13 --> 00:44:15

was very attached to them.

00:44:15 --> 00:44:17

And then suddenly one day they were all

00:44:17 --> 00:44:17

gone.

00:44:20 --> 00:44:22

Tell us a little bit about what that

00:44:22 --> 00:44:24

sacrifice is is all about and and what

00:44:24 --> 00:44:27

it means and how you celebrate it here.

00:44:29 --> 00:44:32

Again, it's it's an animal whose life is,

00:44:32 --> 00:44:33

you know,

00:44:33 --> 00:44:34

precious

00:44:35 --> 00:44:35

in that,

00:44:36 --> 00:44:38

you know, we know the story of Abraham,

00:44:38 --> 00:44:39

the whole holiday,

00:44:40 --> 00:44:41

the whole Hajj ritual,

00:44:42 --> 00:44:45

revolves around the story of Abraham, the prophet,

00:44:46 --> 00:44:48

whose son it was that was going to

00:44:48 --> 00:44:50

be sacrificed is really inconsequential.

00:44:51 --> 00:44:54

Muslims generally say it was Ishmael, whereas,

00:44:54 --> 00:44:56

the Christian tradition holds that it's

00:44:57 --> 00:44:57

Isaac.

00:44:58 --> 00:45:00

But it's the whole idea of sacrificing,

00:45:01 --> 00:45:02

you know, what God is asking us to

00:45:02 --> 00:45:05

do. We're doing it, whereas at the last

00:45:05 --> 00:45:08

moment, the son is withdrawn and the ram

00:45:08 --> 00:45:11

or the animal is given in in place.

00:45:11 --> 00:45:11

But

00:45:12 --> 00:45:14

this idea of sacrifice

00:45:14 --> 00:45:17

not being that we're doing some blood

00:45:26 --> 00:45:27

And,

00:45:27 --> 00:45:30

really, this whole idea of of idl adhata,

00:45:31 --> 00:45:32

the feast of the sacrifice,

00:45:33 --> 00:45:36

is is about people eating meat

00:45:37 --> 00:45:38

who might not eat meat

00:45:39 --> 00:45:40

at all in the year.

00:45:41 --> 00:45:43

Many people in the world

00:45:44 --> 00:45:47

don't eat meat like we eat meat maybe

00:45:47 --> 00:45:47

every day.

00:45:49 --> 00:45:51

They have it at the 2 festivals.

00:45:52 --> 00:45:55

So that's another context, I think, that we,

00:45:55 --> 00:45:58

as Muslims, need to remember as well because

00:45:58 --> 00:45:59

we've grown,

00:45:59 --> 00:46:02

you know, wealthy Muslims living in wealthy places

00:46:02 --> 00:46:05

have the same tendency to forget the real

00:46:05 --> 00:46:06

meanings behind these things.

00:46:06 --> 00:46:09

So when animals are slaughtered, then that 1

00:46:09 --> 00:46:11

third of that meat is going to your

00:46:11 --> 00:46:11

neighbors.

00:46:12 --> 00:46:13

One third of that meat is going to

00:46:13 --> 00:46:15

your poor people in your community,

00:46:15 --> 00:46:18

and you're keeping 1 third for your festivities.

00:46:20 --> 00:46:23

Is this something that you're able to also

00:46:23 --> 00:46:25

do, here? I I asked you, Abdallah,

00:46:26 --> 00:46:28

the imagine the is a little different, or

00:46:28 --> 00:46:30

Bayram, as you would say, a little different,

00:46:30 --> 00:46:32

here than it would be in Turkey.

00:46:32 --> 00:46:33

It is.

00:46:35 --> 00:46:35

In terms

00:46:37 --> 00:46:38

of the sacrifice,

00:46:39 --> 00:46:42

we have been consistently every year

00:46:44 --> 00:46:45

deciding, choosing to

00:46:47 --> 00:46:47

donate

00:46:48 --> 00:46:50

the money that sort of

00:46:50 --> 00:46:52

there is a certain amount that would buy,

00:46:52 --> 00:46:53

you know, is

00:46:53 --> 00:46:55

is cheap or or or

00:46:56 --> 00:46:57

or something like that in different

00:46:58 --> 00:47:00

various parts of the world. So

00:47:00 --> 00:47:03

we've elected to donate the money where the

00:47:03 --> 00:47:04

charity organizations

00:47:05 --> 00:47:06

would on our behalf,

00:47:08 --> 00:47:11

would then provide the meat to to needy

00:47:11 --> 00:47:12

people in other parts of the world or

00:47:12 --> 00:47:14

in the United States.

00:47:16 --> 00:47:18

In terms of celebrating the holiday,

00:47:20 --> 00:47:23

of course, I'm in a unique

00:47:23 --> 00:47:25

sort of position here because my

00:47:26 --> 00:47:27

parents,

00:47:27 --> 00:47:27

my

00:47:28 --> 00:47:30

bigger family are not here. So that is

00:47:30 --> 00:47:33

that because holidays are the times of the

00:47:33 --> 00:47:35

year when you get together with your parents,

00:47:35 --> 00:47:36

when you visit your

00:47:37 --> 00:47:39

relatives and and get their blessings.

00:47:40 --> 00:47:42

But on the other hand, there is

00:47:42 --> 00:47:44

a community here.

00:47:45 --> 00:47:47

And and the beauty beauty of that community

00:47:47 --> 00:47:49

is that it's really a mosaic

00:47:50 --> 00:47:53

of of of the cultures of of of

00:47:53 --> 00:47:55

this planet. When you go to,

00:47:57 --> 00:47:58

holiday prayer here,

00:48:00 --> 00:48:01

which take place in the morning of the

00:48:01 --> 00:48:02

first day of the holiday,

00:48:04 --> 00:48:06

It's it's amazing. Different

00:48:07 --> 00:48:08

clothing, different

00:48:08 --> 00:48:13

colors, different ethnical background, different languages being spoken,

00:48:14 --> 00:48:17

and it really reminds you that you're a

00:48:17 --> 00:48:19

member of a whole planet.

00:48:20 --> 00:48:21

Whereas

00:48:21 --> 00:48:22

if you're in

00:48:23 --> 00:48:24

a more homogeneous,

00:48:24 --> 00:48:27

society, say where I was born and raised

00:48:27 --> 00:48:28

in Turkey,

00:48:29 --> 00:48:32

you don't you don't get that experience. Mhmm.

00:48:32 --> 00:48:33

And I think it's That's one of the

00:48:33 --> 00:48:36

amazing things about the American Muslim community.

00:48:37 --> 00:48:39

Like 80 countries of the world are are

00:48:39 --> 00:48:41

represented by Muslims in America

00:48:42 --> 00:48:44

and and America is the most diverse religious

00:48:45 --> 00:48:46

country in the world

00:48:47 --> 00:48:48

and I think that's our strength.

00:48:48 --> 00:48:49

Absolutely.

00:48:50 --> 00:48:51

Thank you. Yeah.

00:48:52 --> 00:48:53

As we look at the unrest around the

00:48:53 --> 00:48:56

world today, much of which seems to be

00:48:56 --> 00:48:58

explained by some in religious terms,

00:48:58 --> 00:49:00

do you see it as having a religious

00:49:01 --> 00:49:02

core to it or do you think we

00:49:02 --> 00:49:03

should be looking elsewhere?

00:49:08 --> 00:49:10

No. I think that there's a danger in

00:49:10 --> 00:49:12

ignoring the religious element of it.

00:49:13 --> 00:49:15

By saying that it's entirely political,

00:49:15 --> 00:49:16

you're disregarding

00:49:17 --> 00:49:19

a very deep set belief

00:49:20 --> 00:49:23

in every individual who is involved in any,

00:49:24 --> 00:49:27

let's say, the Iraq conflict or the Palestinian

00:49:28 --> 00:49:28

conflict.

00:49:29 --> 00:49:32

On both sides. You're ignoring something that is

00:49:32 --> 00:49:33

essential to

00:49:34 --> 00:49:34

the,

00:49:36 --> 00:49:37

individual identity

00:49:37 --> 00:49:39

and to do that is is extremely dangerous,

00:49:39 --> 00:49:40

but to say that it's

00:49:41 --> 00:49:44

entirely religion is also extremely dangerous because it

00:49:44 --> 00:49:46

ignores political, economic factors,

00:49:48 --> 00:49:49

everything else, but

00:49:50 --> 00:49:52

any of the conflicts in the world are

00:49:52 --> 00:49:52

such

00:49:53 --> 00:49:53

huge

00:49:54 --> 00:49:55

complicated issues

00:49:55 --> 00:49:57

that we have to look at religion and

00:49:57 --> 00:49:58

everything else.

00:50:01 --> 00:50:02

So many of our important,

00:50:03 --> 00:50:04

thinkers I think,

00:50:05 --> 00:50:06

talk more about the

00:50:07 --> 00:50:09

problems of modernity.

00:50:10 --> 00:50:13

Karen Armstrong comes to mind who can speak

00:50:13 --> 00:50:16

about different religions because she studied them and

00:50:16 --> 00:50:17

writes about them,

00:50:18 --> 00:50:20

in a popular way to make it easy

00:50:20 --> 00:50:22

for us to kind of, get a grasp.

00:50:22 --> 00:50:25

And the idea of, you know, this,

00:50:26 --> 00:50:27

sort of,

00:50:28 --> 00:50:29

every individual

00:50:30 --> 00:50:32

interprets religion on their own,

00:50:32 --> 00:50:36

whereas, you know, we had traditions of scholarship

00:50:37 --> 00:50:38

in all of the basic,

00:50:39 --> 00:50:42

faith traditions that are being lost or are

00:50:42 --> 00:50:42

being

00:50:43 --> 00:50:43

forgotten

00:50:44 --> 00:50:47

and, you know, with the advent of modern

00:50:47 --> 00:50:49

technology, we have, you know,

00:50:50 --> 00:50:52

ways of communicating now that are

00:50:52 --> 00:50:55

so much faster and so much,

00:50:57 --> 00:50:59

you know, had the the sword is a

00:50:59 --> 00:51:02

double edged sword. It cuts both ways

00:51:03 --> 00:51:06

so that, you know, anybody can launch a

00:51:06 --> 00:51:07

website or put out information,

00:51:08 --> 00:51:10

and say they're an authority.

00:51:11 --> 00:51:13

Whereas before, you know, when getting back to

00:51:13 --> 00:51:14

dress,

00:51:14 --> 00:51:16

it used to be, you know, the man

00:51:16 --> 00:51:17

with the turban

00:51:18 --> 00:51:19

was a recognized,

00:51:20 --> 00:51:20

scholar

00:51:21 --> 00:51:23

because to wear the turban or to wear

00:51:23 --> 00:51:25

a certain kind of clothing meant

00:51:26 --> 00:51:28

that they spent their life studying

00:51:29 --> 00:51:32

and they were recognized within their particular group,

00:51:33 --> 00:51:34

by the clothing.

00:51:34 --> 00:51:36

Whereas now, it seems like we put on

00:51:36 --> 00:51:37

the clothing

00:51:37 --> 00:51:39

to make, you know,

00:51:39 --> 00:51:41

to make up for the lack of scholarship.

00:51:41 --> 00:51:43

I personally believe

00:51:44 --> 00:51:46

most, if not all, conflicts,

00:51:47 --> 00:51:48

are not religious.

00:51:50 --> 00:51:53

They are political. They are about power, about

00:51:53 --> 00:51:56

land. But then religion, whenever possible, just like

00:51:56 --> 00:51:59

another instrument they can use, will be used

00:51:59 --> 00:52:00

by the parties

00:52:01 --> 00:52:03

to to gather support.

00:52:04 --> 00:52:07

And let's not forget that the biggest wars

00:52:08 --> 00:52:10

we had, especially in the last century, were

00:52:10 --> 00:52:12

not religious wars.

00:52:15 --> 00:52:17

One of the truisms that one hears about

00:52:17 --> 00:52:20

Islam is that there is no separation between,

00:52:21 --> 00:52:22

the politics

00:52:23 --> 00:52:25

and the religion. Right? There's no separation between

00:52:25 --> 00:52:26

religion and state.

00:52:27 --> 00:52:29

Do you think, I mean,

00:52:30 --> 00:52:32

your just your own personal opinion

00:52:33 --> 00:52:34

that we should

00:52:34 --> 00:52:37

try to inject more religion into

00:52:37 --> 00:52:37

politics?

00:52:38 --> 00:52:38

Do you think

00:52:39 --> 00:52:40

that the separation

00:52:40 --> 00:52:43

is a generally positive thing? And of course,

00:52:43 --> 00:52:46

I'm I'm asking you in your multiple identities

00:52:47 --> 00:52:48

as Muslims and Americans.

00:52:49 --> 00:52:53

That's a very difficult and very complex question.

00:52:55 --> 00:52:56

More religion

00:52:57 --> 00:52:58

in politics.

00:52:59 --> 00:53:00

It depends on what your idea of religion

00:53:00 --> 00:53:01

is because,

00:53:03 --> 00:53:03

everyone

00:53:04 --> 00:53:07

says, you know, do you believe in Islamic

00:53:07 --> 00:53:09

government? Do you not believe in Islamic government?

00:53:09 --> 00:53:10

What is Islamic government?

00:53:11 --> 00:53:13

And who do you ask? Who who are

00:53:13 --> 00:53:15

the scholars that you follow who will determine

00:53:16 --> 00:53:17

an Islamic government?

00:53:18 --> 00:53:21

And what falls under what's acceptable in an

00:53:21 --> 00:53:22

Islamic government?

00:53:23 --> 00:53:23

Usually,

00:53:24 --> 00:53:26

historically, that has been pluralist and has allowed

00:53:26 --> 00:53:27

for

00:53:27 --> 00:53:28

different interpretations

00:53:29 --> 00:53:31

of Islam and has allowed for

00:53:32 --> 00:53:34

non Muslims to live within that government,

00:53:35 --> 00:53:36

with

00:53:36 --> 00:53:38

different rules for them.

00:53:41 --> 00:53:42

There's a danger of

00:53:43 --> 00:53:47

today allowing any one religious group, sect,

00:53:49 --> 00:53:51

political group to take over in the name

00:53:51 --> 00:53:52

of religion,

00:53:53 --> 00:53:56

and have all of the say over the

00:53:56 --> 00:53:58

lives of every citizen in that country.

00:54:01 --> 00:54:01

So,

00:54:02 --> 00:54:04

I don't know, I guess, I ideally I

00:54:04 --> 00:54:05

still believe that an

00:54:05 --> 00:54:07

an Islamic government is

00:54:07 --> 00:54:08

possible and

00:54:09 --> 00:54:11

should happen someday.

00:54:12 --> 00:54:14

When that will happen is the big question.

00:54:15 --> 00:54:18

I personally believe that it depends on the

00:54:18 --> 00:54:20

circumstance. I mean, Islam

00:54:21 --> 00:54:24

did start out kind of politically as well.

00:54:24 --> 00:54:27

I mean, our prophet was also involved in

00:54:27 --> 00:54:29

politics, so it's not such a bad thing

00:54:30 --> 00:54:30

to

00:54:31 --> 00:54:33

have religion with politics. But at the same

00:54:33 --> 00:54:33

time,

00:54:33 --> 00:54:37

nowadays, especially, we see these political leaders using

00:54:37 --> 00:54:38

religion

00:54:38 --> 00:54:40

to hurt others, and I think that's very

00:54:40 --> 00:54:42

wrong. So it depends on the circumstance.

00:54:45 --> 00:54:46

I personally think

00:54:47 --> 00:54:49

Islam is is secular.

00:54:52 --> 00:54:54

There is there is a very strong there's

00:54:54 --> 00:54:57

another verse in the Quran that where

00:54:57 --> 00:54:59

it's very clear you cannot impose

00:55:00 --> 00:55:01

your religion,

00:55:02 --> 00:55:04

your way of life on others.

00:55:06 --> 00:55:09

Now the question of how much religion

00:55:09 --> 00:55:11

to insert in the society,

00:55:11 --> 00:55:14

that's something that the society decides. I mean,

00:55:14 --> 00:55:14

we

00:55:15 --> 00:55:18

we insert more religion, say, in our society

00:55:18 --> 00:55:19

than the Europeans have.

00:55:20 --> 00:55:22

Does that mean we're not secular?

00:55:23 --> 00:55:24

Not necessarily.

00:55:28 --> 00:55:30

The religion cannot be

00:55:31 --> 00:55:32

in Islamic

00:55:32 --> 00:55:32

tradition,

00:55:33 --> 00:55:36

religion cannot be imposed on on those who

00:55:36 --> 00:55:37

don't want it.

00:55:38 --> 00:55:40

In fact, again, if you look at the

00:55:40 --> 00:55:42

Ottoman period, for instance, it's very interesting,

00:55:43 --> 00:55:45

not only that they didn't

00:55:45 --> 00:55:46

impose,

00:55:48 --> 00:55:49

the religion on the minorities,

00:55:51 --> 00:55:53

otherwise a big chunk of the world today

00:55:53 --> 00:55:55

would be speaking Turkish and would be Muslim.

00:55:57 --> 00:55:57

But even,

00:55:58 --> 00:55:59

say, Istanbul,

00:56:01 --> 00:56:02

they would let

00:56:02 --> 00:56:04

Armenian Orthodox

00:56:04 --> 00:56:07

members to have their own panel court.

00:56:07 --> 00:56:09

They would let the Jewish,

00:56:10 --> 00:56:11

part of the society

00:56:11 --> 00:56:13

to have their own rules and regulations.

00:56:15 --> 00:56:16

So it was,

00:56:18 --> 00:56:19

it was very

00:56:20 --> 00:56:21

secular in that sense.

00:56:22 --> 00:56:24

And you were subject to

00:56:24 --> 00:56:26

the rules and regulations

00:56:26 --> 00:56:29

of particular religion if you chose to be

00:56:29 --> 00:56:31

a member of that religion

00:56:31 --> 00:56:33

and and chose to be bound

00:56:34 --> 00:56:36

by the rules of of that religion.

00:56:36 --> 00:56:38

So from that perspective,

00:56:39 --> 00:56:40

I believe that

00:56:40 --> 00:56:41

Islam is is secular.

00:56:42 --> 00:56:45

Yeah. I I don't think that any particular

00:56:45 --> 00:56:45

political,

00:56:47 --> 00:56:48

arrangement

00:56:48 --> 00:56:49

has been ordained

00:56:49 --> 00:56:50

in Islam.

00:56:51 --> 00:56:53

So, you know, when we look at history,

00:56:53 --> 00:56:54

we see a variety

00:56:55 --> 00:56:56

of political

00:56:57 --> 00:57:00

appointments in various Muslim places

00:57:01 --> 00:57:03

but it's not as if,

00:57:03 --> 00:57:05

that is ordained by God.

00:57:05 --> 00:57:06

We have

00:57:07 --> 00:57:10

failure of of political Islam in many cases,

00:57:10 --> 00:57:11

but,

00:57:11 --> 00:57:12

we also,

00:57:13 --> 00:57:15

can see that there is a history,

00:57:17 --> 00:57:18

there is

00:57:18 --> 00:57:19

a lot of information

00:57:20 --> 00:57:22

available about the prophet's,

00:57:22 --> 00:57:23

constitution

00:57:24 --> 00:57:26

and his treaties and his political

00:57:27 --> 00:57:28

governance

00:57:28 --> 00:57:30

that we can glean information

00:57:31 --> 00:57:31

from

00:57:32 --> 00:57:35

to apply it to our time now. But

00:57:35 --> 00:57:37

it's just like any political experiment.

00:57:38 --> 00:57:39

The American experiment

00:57:40 --> 00:57:41

is not without flaws.

00:57:41 --> 00:57:44

I mean, we have an election where is

00:57:44 --> 00:57:47

it, 30% of the people are are voting

00:57:47 --> 00:57:47

in our elections?

00:57:48 --> 00:57:50

So, I mean, this is not truly the

00:57:50 --> 00:57:51

voice of the people,

00:57:51 --> 00:57:54

and we have a prison system where

00:57:55 --> 00:57:57

the most people in the world are incarcerated

00:57:57 --> 00:57:58

in our prisons. So,

00:57:59 --> 00:58:02

there are problems with our system. Let's let's

00:58:02 --> 00:58:03

be realistic about all

00:58:04 --> 00:58:07

the political systems of the world as not

00:58:07 --> 00:58:09

We haven't found all of the answers we're

00:58:09 --> 00:58:10

still seeking.

00:58:11 --> 00:58:13

Thank you very much. And I want to

00:58:13 --> 00:58:16

thank, all of our panelists, Saqibha Khan, Lamine

00:58:16 --> 00:58:16

Kowalski,

00:58:17 --> 00:58:20

Abdullah Yavas, and Jordan Lane. And thanks to

00:58:20 --> 00:58:23

all of you for a delightful, enjoyable conversation.

00:58:30 --> 00:58:32

This has been a production of WPSU.

00:58:36 --> 00:58:38

A copy of the program you've just seen

00:58:38 --> 00:58:39

can be purchased through [email protected]

00:58:44 --> 00:58:45

or by calling 800-770-2111.

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