Ismail Kamdar – Legacy of the Ottoman Empire

			Bismillah al Rahman al Rahim and hamdu Lillahi Rabbil Alameen wa salatu salam ala Sayidina Muhammad
one.
		

			As Ryan, a Salam alaykum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh. This is a Ramadan edition of Living the Legacy,
the program airing to you in sha Allah in Ramadan, and midway of Ramadan and we continue exploring
our legacy. Or this time the legacy takes us to the past and so we must know our past to be able to
live and leave behind a legacy. Our guest today is someone who is deeply immersed in history,
Islamic history, and who has written extensively talked extensively on the topic of Islamic history.
Our guest today is author, Imam and research manager at Yaqeen Institute. She has its may come to a
Salam alaykum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh.
		

			While he can sit down with rahmatullahi wa barakato. Thank you for having me. Amin Amin, our
pleasure chef, and we are really looking forward to learning today going back into history. with you
on this topic. In the past, we've spoken to Chef about spiritual growth in Ramadan. But today we're
going into history. So to give our listeners a bit of a background, we know that the Ottoman empire
based its authority on religion from the start, they had played a vital role during the time to
preserve Islamic scriptures. And one aspect that stands out is that the importance of the Islamic
scholars that they played during that time. If we look at that time, the Mongols were on a path
		

			where they tried to destroy Islamic scripture, and they did capture and kill Islamic scholars. Today
we are looking at the role of the Ottoman Empire and what lessons we can take from them. If we may
begin by asking you to tell us firstly, why why is the Ottoman Empire so important in our Islamic
history? And perhaps as part of that as an extension to that? Why do we need to read about the
Muslims of that time?
		

			Is very important question.
		

			As to firstly, why the Ottomans are important. Well, the Ottomans ruled the Muslim world for 600
years, it only ended exactly 99 years ago. So that's almost half of our history. If we don't know
about the Ottoman Empire, that's half of Muslim history that we are unaware of. And this indicates a
bigger problem that we have amongst English speaking Muslims today is that in general, we tend to be
ignorant about history, right? That we focus on the most important part of history, which is the
Sierra and the whole of our regime, and rightly so that is the most important part of history. But
beyond that, most of us don't know about the Sumerians the Abbas's the Mamelukes, the Mughals, the
		

			dailies will Donald or the Ottoman Empire. And from all of these empires, the Ottoman Empire is
important for several reasons. The first reason being that it was the last caliphate, and the
establishment of the Ottoman Empire, allowed the caliphate to endure past the Mongol invasion, all
the way to World War One, which is a huge accomplishment. It means for 1300 years, we have the
caliphate. And for 500 years, the Ottoman Empire is what held that for us. A second reason why it's
important is that the Ottoman Empire is primarily responsible for the spread of Islam in Europe. So
while the early caliphate were in Arabia, with the Romanians, being in Damascus, and the advances
		

			being in Baghdad, the Ottomans were in Constantinople, which is modern day Istanbul, which is in
Europe, should you have a European caliphate with the Empire spreading into Greece, and into the
Balkans and into what is today in many parts of Russia. All of this was part of the Ottoman Empire
and Islam spread into Europe through this empire. So the Ottomans play a very important role in our
history. And for me, the main reason why we should study them is because they make up almost half of
our history. And if you're unaware of Ottoman history, then we have a gap of 600 years of our
history that we have, we are completely clueless about. Why should we study history is it's quite
		

			simple number one, to connect us with our legacy, to know where we came from both the good and the
bad of it, to know the mistakes of the people of the past or we can not repeat the mistakes and to
know of the successes of the people of the past or we can repeat the successes. And also history
allows us to to see how Islam functions when it is on top. Because in a modern world, Muslims are
not on top politically or you can
		

			Honestly. So for Muslims who are disconnected from the history, they may not be aware of the fact
that there are several points in history where Muslim Muslims were the superpower. And, you know,
you get to see how Muslims function as a superpower when you study the Ottomans at the height of
their power. So it's really important to connect ourselves to history and the Ottomans are a really
important part of that legacy.
		

			I don't know if anybody hears this interview, they're not convinced after how eloquently you told us
how relevant how significant abortion they are about Islamic history? I don't know wouldn't be
confidence. Subhanallah Absolutely, absolutely. I think anyone listening to what you've shared with
us about why it's so motivating that they would want to go and learn
		

			more about our Islamic history and talking about that listeners suresmile has put together a
comprehensive course. It is available on Islamic selfhelp.gumroad.com. And it's called Journey
Through Muslim history. There are videos notes,
		

			the more than 1700 students who have done this course and it's all about includes the Ottomans as
well and other amazing empires. And I think that's, that's amazing. We have access to that. And
Allah bless you for putting together this information that we cannot access so easily just looking
behind. Take us through but more about this anything more about the Ottoman Empire, what is it that
they did for Islam at the time?
		

			Okay, so the most important thing that the Ottoman Empire did for Islam at that time, was it saved
the caliphate from extinction. So we're living through an era now where for 99 years, we'd haven't
had a Caliph. And before that the Caliphate was with the Ottomans. And honestly, if the Ottoman
Empire never came about, then we would have lost the caliphate about 600 years ago, 700 years ago.
So what happened about 700 years ago was the Mongol invasion. The Mongols they devastated the world
or the Asian world, they took over China, they took over
		

			Russia, India, and then they took over the important parts of the Muslim world including Baghdad,
where they decimated Baghdad, killed the Obama and killed the last of us in Calif. So at that point,
it looked like the Caliphate was over the head, the Muslims were now going to have the lower hand
and the Mongols were going to have the upper hand. And what happened next was a series of incredible
events number one, a group of slaves who rose up in Egypt and fought off the Mongols and they became
the Mameluke empire. So my book actually mean slaves, that a slave dynasty ruled over Egypt and
Makkah and Medina and Jerusalem and preserve the caliphate, through a proxy of acid ruler, and kept
		

			the Mongols at bay. That's the first amazing thing they happen. The second amazing thing that
happened at that point is the Mongols within three generations converted to Islam themselves, and
especially those ruling over the Muslim lands and they became a Muslim empire of their own. And this
is one of the only points in history where the Conqueror accepted the religion of the conquered
because they were so amazed by the beauty of Islam. The third amazing thing that happened at that
point was the rise of the Ottomans. And their history is amazing because the otter the the Ottomans
come from a series of nomadic Turkish tribes that had been traveling west from Mongolia all the way
		

			to what is today turkey. At that time, it wasn't called Turkey. And at that time, they found
themselves sandwiched between the Crusaders of the West and the Mongols of the East, both trying to
destroy them. So they had to adapt to the situation they couldn't live a nomadic lifestyle anymore
facing jihad on to France. And so they
		

			they establish some towns in cities to defend themselves to form a civilization to protect
themselves against both the Mongols and the Crusaders. And over time, they grew and they expanded
taking over nearby cities and countries until within 100 years they were an empire of their own. It
wasn't something they sought out to do, it was just a reaction to the situation held the highly
fictionalized TV show to rule it kind of shows us but in a very fictionalized way. So like a total
Ghazi was the leader of this nomadic tribe, and they he he jihad against the Crusaders in the
Mongols for about 40 years. And to adapt to the situation. Him and his son are smart and smart is
		

			the founder of the hush money dynasty of the Ottoman dynasty. They established a city to protect
themselves from the Mongols and the Crusaders, and they establish the city upon Islam and upon
jihad, and fighting off the Mongols and the Crusades. At the same time, they continue to expand in
both directions until within 100 years they had this empire
		

			So the single most important thing the Ottoman Empire did for Islam was the preservation of a
caliphate or an Islamic state at a time, when people thought that it's all for people thought you
were at the end of the world. Like, if you read the books written at that time, or llama alive at
that time, they thought that the Mongols we argued in module and they thought the world was ending,
but it was the color of Allah that the Ummah was going to go on for another 600 years, the
difference being, you know, I like to split our history into two segments. The first half of our
history was the rule of the Arab dynasties. And the second half of history was the rule of the
		

			Turkish dynasty. And so it was almost got away from this point, the Muslims wouldn't be ruled by the
Arabs, but by the Turks instead. And so we had the rise of the Ottoman Empire, to which Islam was
preserved for another 600 years.
		

			I'm sure some of the scholars we know today are from that period, can you touch on who they are? Why
did the Ottoman Empire from the start hold and importance
		

			to Islamic scholars?
		

			Yeah, and the influence that those scholars had, on the Empire itself.
		

			So as to why the Ottoman Empire held in importance to Islamic scholars, it's the same with any
Muslim empire. If you're, if your empire is established upon Islam, then you need the Obama to make
sure that you're doing it properly. Now, obviously, not all of the Ottoman kings were good. Every
dynasty in our history had the good rulers and the bad rulers. And honestly, most of the kings now
in history are just human, you know, they had the good qualities and the bad qualities. And one of
the things they all had that was, you know, keep them in check, stop them from
		

			jumping on the worst impulses. So, the early Ottoman so like Amish man, Ghazi and his son are fun.
		

			They were very strongly linked to the Sufi telecast. And so they had a, they had a spiritual guide
from from the Sufi Allama, who they would follow. And this was a trend that kept up throughout the
Ottoman Empire, the most of the Ottoman rulers did have a spiritual guide from amongst the law that
helped to keep them in check. Now, it's difficult to point point out specific scholars by name
because the Turkish Hana V Alama, or like a different tradition from the Indian and a viola ma so
from India was never part of the Ottoman Empire, it was a separate empire. At that point, it was the
Mughal Empire, the Mongols had converted to Islam and become the Mughal empire. And they were ruling
		

			over India. So they had a separate traditional pallava in that empire from the Ottoman Empire. But
just to give one example of an ottoman scholar and his influence, we look at the great move to Abu
shoot attending. So I will shoot affendi was a scholar of fic and tafsir, in Constantinople, or
Istanbul, at the time of Solomon render percent. So the magnificent is perhaps the most famous of
all the Ottoman rulers his reign is considered the golden age of Islam, or certainly the golden age
of the Ottoman Empire. He ruled for 45 years. And Solomon, recognizing the deep scholarship and
piety of Abu shoot attended, he promoted him to the position of shareholder Islam. So the Ottoman
		

			Empire had this this position called shareholder Islam in the shuffle, Islam essentially was the
most important scholar in the entire empire. His level of importance was so high that he would
decide for example, the, the mud hub of the Empire, which ended up being the 100 demise of any way
throughout the empire, because he was always 100, the scholar promoted to this position, he would
decide the official fatawa of the of the of the empire. And he even made fatwas on what the the
Sultan himself could or could not do. And this is interesting that Solomon took, I will shoot again
these fatwas very seriously like, if he wanted to declare jihad against someone, or if he wanted to
		

			execute someone for for treachery or betraying the Empire. He would get a fatwa from Abu shoot
apparently first before before taking action.
		

			Because you know, like taking the life of a trader would have been considered haram, unless you had
the actual artwork on the ground moved you to say that this person indeed has betrayed the Muslim
empire and deserves the death penalty. And so, he would consult a who should attend the on major,
major matters regarding the running of the empire, whether it was Jihad related or dealing with
traitors, or establishing the halal and haram or taxes, or all of these things, he would take Fatah,
the fatwas of Abu affendi seriously and I will show you the event he served in this position as the
Austria who Islam of the Ottoman Empire right until he passed away. So that's, that's a great
		

			example of just how highly influential a scholar was in this era.
		

			pyrogen even just so dang himself would not take action without a fatwa from from the shareholder
Islam.
		

			I can't imagine what you know how much more we can actually learn in the in the course we're
learning so much from you today. It's fascinating martial law in
		

			the sense that, you know, we understand that from being a scholar in the Ottoman Empire. That was,
as you highlighted to us a very influential position. And let's bring that to today's time, where
many parents
		

			have the sentiments that there are enough colors? How can we look at the history of that time to
understand that we do need scholars scholars of distinction,
		

			and that it is a high ranking profession. And both in this dunya and in the higher up in this, this
whole misconception of people look down on those that go to an ALU? Or study Islamic sciences?
		

			So, this question, it's difficult for me to answer these are being a bit controversial, right?
Because they are problems in our time that are causing this mindset that didn't exist in the Ottoman
times, and just give you one example, you're most welcome to elaborate as you feel comfortable to
please. Okay.
		

			So just to give you one example, the Ottoman Empire paid the whole amount very well. So there was a
financial incentive to be a scholar in the Ottoman era. While many of our communities today play,
pay the the Imams and the scholars, you know, just like minimum wage. So there is this idea that if
my son becomes a scholar, then he's not gonna be able to support his family, I dealt with this
myself, when I first started studying, I come from a family of entrepreneurs and businessmen, not
not all of us. So when I first started studying, you know, the idea was how you're going to support
a family. But you know, it's got a ruler, I still have the same entrepreneurial spirit of my family.
		

			So I have my online courses and things while I'm still earning as well as I would have either way.
But for many others, it's not like that. Like if you just put your take up a position today as an
imam in the masjid,
		

			the very few bastions that pay you your word, right now, another important thing that's missing was
in those days, the way off dedicated to funding Obama. So Obama did not have to worry about money.
During the time of the passage, or the mayor or the Ottomans, you could become a scholar and not
worry about money at all for the rest of your life. We see this for example, my Malik was paid a
very strong stipend by the government, or others, like you know, Abu Hanifa and Imam Al Bukhari who
has their own businesses, which which, which funded them so they didn't have to worry about money,
they lived very healthy lifestyles, so that that's why they were able to produce scholarship on that
		

			level, people don't realize this, but money is important.
		

			You need your time, you need to be able to not worry about money. So you can produce high level
scholarship. So there's a genuine problem, right, that we're not paying our Ozama well enough and
this is this is D, incentivizing people from the whole concept of becoming scholars. So all of them
are very important, right. They are the inheritors of the Gambia, they continue the work and the
mission of the prophets. And I will say today, we don't need, you know, people say we have too many
Alama I disagree, we may have a lot of graduates, or we don't have that many or the amount or the
caliber that we need, that we need people who can do HD hard on contemporary issues. We need people
		

			who can take the principles of the mud hubs and apply them to new situations and help us understand
new things. We need all of us who understand cryptocurrency so they can give us fatawa on Bitcoin
and things like that we need Allah Ma, who understand the medical science, so they can give us
fatawa on the latest medical developments. We need Allah ma who understand, you know, what life is
like in the West, so they can give us further was it a realistic for living in the West and
surviving in the West? We need, although it's a necessity of our times, but what we need is high
quality Allama. So my advice, you know, I actually have been trying to encourage parents to get
		

			these children to study to be all over. I find that with this generation, even the older man don't
want their children to be older. This is actually experienced, I've had a lot of Madonna's who are
not earning well themselves. They want a better life for their children. So they send the children
to university instead.
		

			And my worry is that within the next 50 years, we're not going to have as much or more as we have
today. Because people are worried about the fact that if I become a scholar, I'm not going to earn
well. So my advice is become a scholar and something else at the same time. So why Why choose one or
the other? Imam Abu Hanifa was a scholar and a businessman.
		

			So I like to follow in my body parts model, you know, I have my business, online courses and my
eBooks and doing Islamic scholarship at the same time.
		

			You know, you I know of Allah ma who are qualified psychologists or the MA who are mechanics or Lama
who
		

			qualified engineers Alama, who are university professors with PhDs, you don't have to limit yourself
to that certain thing. You don't have to limit yourself. And we need, you know, some of the best
alum I know, today adopters, and they are able to give us really good fatawa or medical science. So
I would say, encourage your children to be on an hour, we need all Mr. But don't limit it to such
that, oh, you're Madonna now. So you can't be anything else. No, you can become a scholar and become
a professional in another field and combine that to provide a unique service to the Ummah that
nobody else can. So this is a very, very crucial field for solving the problems of our time that we
		

			have for the amount of the highest caliber, who earn well, and who are deep thinkers and highly
qualified, and who can actually deal with contemporary issues, this is necessary for our time. So my
advice depends, please do not discourage our children from studying the deal. Rather, push them to
be able to do both deen and duniya. Right, because we need all of our are very grateful for that
honest
		

			explanation. And for for really putting it out there. I think that that is what we need. I know my
husband as well, like you mentioned, those that are in academics of PhD and Islamic scholars, my
husband is one of those. And as you mentioned, he shares those same sentiments. And because that is
what the school needs, and it is very worrying, you know, even within the next 1015 20 years, what
is the quality of the ALMA that we are producing,
		

			and the legacy of our scholarship,
		

			which is often a far cry from the past. But then we're very grateful that you've been honest and
shared this we do understand it's a sensitive topic, but it's also a topic we need to speak about.
And Ramadan is the time when people are ready for change, and the hearts are softer. So we hope that
this the sweetest even just one person who who sees it from this angle can make a difference in sha
Allah.
		

			Chef, let's go back again. Now to the Ottomans. We know that the start of the Ottoman Empire led to
the uniting of the nomadic tribes. What role did the Ottoman Empire play in this golden age? And
let's bring it back again to the present. What are some of the lessons that are we use?
		

			That we'll can control from this period?
		

			Okay, so the Muslim empire is all winter cycles. So I do have the arise the Golden Age in the fall.
So we actually had multiple golden ages in our history. When people think about the golden age, they
generally refer to the above golden age. So that's like 300 years after the time of the Prophet
sallallahu wasallam, when the apostle Empire
		

			was at the height of its power, and he was like the most dominant superpower in the world, there was
a time when Mr. Buhari was alive and your body been humbled was alive. And we had great doctors and
scientists and mathematicians, that's the Golden Age people know. But what many people don't realize
is that when the boss of the Empire fell, and then the Ottoman Empire arose, we had another golden
age, right? So at the time of Solomon, the magnificent and his father's Salim, den was a golden age
of the Ottoman Empire, and at the height of their power, in the time of Superman, the magnificent.
The Ottoman Empire is spread across what is today the D countries across three continents. They had
		

			their base in Europe, but they spread across all of North Africa and large parts of Asia as well in
all of the Middle East, that this was a massive empire. And it wasn't just massive in size, but it
was wealthy. It was at that point in time techno technologically advanced later on, the Ottomans
would fall behind in technology. By that point in time, it was technologically advanced.
		

			It was the it was the center of scholarship. So it was an amazing, amazing Empire at that point in
time and a few things too, that we can draw that we can look at as examples of how
		

			how influential the Ottoman Empire was at that time. Number one, the Ottoman Empire is often
referred to as one of the world's first gunpowder empires, right? So they were amongst the first
empires to adapt to the usage of gunpowder for guns and cannons. In fact, that's how they conquered
Constantinople. And that's how they took Baca and Medina and Jerusalem from the Mamelukes that they
had guns and cannons and that made them militarily superior to the opponents who are using swords
and bows and arrows. So just again, the fact that the
		

			The Muslim, a Muslim nation was technologically advanced compared to other nations in terms of
military technology at that time. It's something that just mind blowing today when we see that, you
know, it's often the opposite in the modern world. But at that point in time, they had the best
technology in terms of military that we know the canons that they built to take over contents. But
oppo was the largest canon in the history of this world. It's still you could still find it in a
museum in London.
		

			And another thing they were they were advanced was the architecture. So during the reign of Slimani
birthday present, he had his chief architect architect was a member of Sinan by mmm sin and
developed he designed the Topkapi Palace, the Suleimani masjid and center, many of the schools and
universities and madrasahs and bridges of the Ottoman Empire. And what's fascinating about the
buildings that he designed is that they are still in use vital today that these buildings are still
standing. They have survived over 40 earthquakes over the past 400 years.
		

			And they're still standing and they're still in use and the amongst the safest buildings to use so
he actually designed earthquake proof masjid and schools 400 years ago that we are still using
Reichel today. And when you walk into this masjid, and these palaces, they are absolute works of
art. And his style of architecture even influenced other empires, shall we say that the Indian
Empire was under Mughal rule, it wasn't under Ottoman rule. Yet the Taj Mahal was designed by the
students of numeracy. So his students were the ones who took this architectural design from the
Ottoman Empire to the Mughal empire. And that led to the to the Taj Mahal being being built. So he's
		

			influenced spread outside of his empire. And, you know, another way that the Ottomans had influence
that we won't even think about today was something as simple as coffee, that the whole idea of
coffee shops, were intellectuals go and sit in coffee shops and discuss the deep ideas over a cup of
coffee. This originated in the Ottoman Empire, that the Ottoman Empire, the Ottomans came up with
this idea of just sitting around drinking coffee and talking about deep ideas. In fact, it's
interesting that at one point, the Caliph was so worried that all the intellectuals are getting
together and having discussions in coffee shops, that he tried to get a fatwa passed to ban coffee
		

			shops, because he was worried worried that people were starting rebellions and coos in the coffee
shops, because he was just like, all the intellectual facility getting together and having
discussion. So this whole idea of coffee shops and this culture, we go to coffee shops and sit and
discuss and have creative meetings. This originated in the Ottoman Empire, they popularized coffee
itself, right. And again, this is just an empire having global influence, things that are global
norms today started there.
		

			And one last example I would give is the concept of freedom of religion. So this started with the
Sharia, but the Ottomans systemized it right, so in the Sharia, non Muslims as long as they pay the
Jizya, they have full freedom of religion, to a level higher than even what they have today. And we
see this systemized by the Ottomans into a system that they call the millet system. Millet means
religions, the millet system and what the village system means is that every city and village and
community are ruled by their own religion, as long as they pay the judo. So if you went to the
Ottoman Empire, during his golden age, you would find communities or Christians, which were ruled by
		

			the Bible, and communities of Jews, where they were ruled by the Torah. And these communities had
full and complete freedom of religion. And by full and complete freedom of religion, I mean, even
the the, the penalties for crimes in those communities were carried out according to the Scriptures.
By that this was a level of freedom that doesn't even exist today. We know today there's pressure on
people to change their religions, to suit liberal norms that you know, not allowed to say certain
things are haram and you know, other religions have to cave into this. But in the Ottoman Empire,
they didn't have that. And the freedom of religion was so was so strong that really, Judaism itself
		

			survived because of the Ottoman Empire. When the Russians and the Germans started nations were
oppressing the Jews and killing them. They fled to the Ottoman empire where they had full freedom of
religion. The greatest Jewish philosophers developed and grew in the Ottoman Empire and rotate works
in Turkish and Arabic. And the really, the religion survived because of the level of freedom of
religion that the Ottomans provided to the, to those who pay the Jizya which was far beyond anything
else that existed at that time. Remember, the norm for most of human history was that people were
kind of like forced to follow the religion of the government or flee to another land or the land.
		

			And the only lands where you actually had real freedom of religion were the most of that because the
Muslims had a very simple rule. You pay the Jizya
		

			You know, you've got practice your religion, it was simple as that. Like if you had to go to
Jerusalem, even 100 years ago, Muslims, Jews and Christians lived in complete peace. And they had
it, they own their own celebrations, and they had their own festivals and they own places of
worship, and it was complete peace, right, because the Muslims gave the Jews and Christians that
level of freedom in the Ottoman Empire. So only after the Ottoman Empire collapsed in World War One,
that is the dismiss we see today started, you know, with Zionism, but when the Muslims ruled, all
three religions had full freedom. So lessons we can learn from the Ottoman Empire that when Muslims
		

			are empowered, they have global influence. Muslims excelled in every area, when they were at the
height of their powers from architecture, to just cultural influence, like like coffee, we see that
really Muslim rule is best for society, because the Jews and Christians and other religions have
more freedom to practice their religions as it should be practiced in a in a, you know, in a Islamic
land as compared to the modern world where liberalism is forced upon everyone and people are like
forced to change their religions to suit the liberal doctrine. So you know, this, these are just
some of the lessons that we can draw from from the Ottomans, Golden Age. Incredible, incredible. We
		

			find ourselves
		

			close onto Ramadan, and at the time that this program is we will ensure a love in Ramadan. History
shows us that the early Ottomans relied on Allah subhanaw taala with everything, for everything,
whether it was their provisions, you know, whether it was in strategy or anything else, and they
would sit in dua at the time of distress. How can we now bring the legacy of that, understanding
that concept and adapt that and bring that into our lives today. And now,
		

			this is a very important topic, on my website, Islamic self help.com. One of my most read articles
is seven practical steps to Tawakkol. Right, so I highly recommend for the listeners to go and read
that article where I basically take it from even a mile Josias book by Dr. Sally Keane, diagrams of
the righteous, where he talks about the rank of the worker and he breaks it down into seven stages.
		

			And this is something really important that that needs to be revived that we've kind of healing our
times we talked about the workout but we don't teach people how the house of the workout and even
when do you know for many of us do is just a ritual that we raise our hands the Imam makes a dua we
don't know what the mommy saying and we daydreaming. But do I supposed to be from the heart it's
supposed to be you talking to Allah and pouring your heart out to Allah and ask him begging Allah
for help. And many of us have never done that in our life. You know, we've completely ritualized
this concept. Ramadan is a good time to change this because in Ramadan, Neo was answered, you know,
		

			at the time of Huddersfield, at a time of soul at a time of Iftar these old times into other
answered, so this is a good time to revive this practice of waking up, sitting on your masala and
pouring your heart out to Allah in your own language, really genuinely asking Allah for what you
want. And there's a few tips I would share on how to do this number one, so called stems from a
correct understanding of who is Allah. And for many of us again, you know, we know Allah exists, but
we don't really contemplate his names and attributes enough. If we contemplate the name, the
attributes of Allah, the more you you understand who Allah is the most powerful you will have. So
		

			when you understand that nothing happens except for Allah wills, then you become content with the
color of Allah, even when you are going through difficult times you know that this is what Allah has
revealed and what Allah wills is best for me. You know that the only the only one who can change
your color is Allah so you make dua to Allah and you ask Allah for help and nobody else.
		

			When you understand that Allah is our Rosa, that Allah is the provider, and that anything you need
is only Allah who can provide it to you, then you are going to wake up in the middle of night and
you're going to ask Allah proficiently, you're not going to ask anyone else for it because you know,
only Allah can give you what you deeply desire.
		

			So really, number one is it stems from learning the names and attributes of Allah and understanding
them on a deeper level. And there's a beautiful book on this topic written by one of the other
researchers at getting Institute Dr. Gina and yourself. She's a great scholar from from the UK. And
she's written this amazing book on the call reflecting on the names attributes of Allah. So huge
book permission, it's something I highly recommend for every Muslim home, every Muslim home should
have a copy of her book, where she really breaks down each of the names of Allah and the lessons we
can take from it and the practical lessons we can take from it and how to connect to Allah through
		

			His names and attributes. So Dr. junan use of get ahold of her works on the names of Allah. It's
absolutely
		

			absolute masterpiece. So connecting to our guests number one number two is to take advantage of the
time of tahajjud. Right and this is easier in Ramadan because we are awake at that time to eat the
soul of saving. So my advice is when you waking up early, wake up 15 minutes earlier, make will do
three to two just to the gods of tahajud. And then sit and make dua until it's time to eat. Just sit
and make dua and do that every day for the rest of Ramadan, you will notice a stronger level of the
Wako a stronger sense of piety, a deeper connection of connection with Allah, more inner peace. And
many, many people I know experience miracles during this time, many people I know were stuck on
		

			issues that they felt were unresolvable, that were impossible to fix. When they woke up at the hydro
time, in the month of Ramadan, and poured their heart out to Allah, the problems were solved in the
most miraculous of ways that they themselves witnessed the Corolla, the keramat have twice been
answered. So disease, a few things we can do to revive this practices. Number one is to reconnect
with the names attributes of Allah, and to understand who Allah is on a deeper level. And number two
is to take advantage of the time of tahajjud, especially in the month of Ramadan, because in the
month of Ramadan, three things are combining tahajjud plus Ramadan, plus two whole, right and in the
		

			last few nights plus, you know, they will call them, so that magnifies, the opportunities are
endless being answered. So take advantage of that, and inshallah you could with this murderdolls
		

			100 exam. And finally, if we could ask you, where can one learn or read more about the Ottomans,
their role in modern Islamic history? Tell us a bit more about how listeners can purchase your books
or your courses on this topic, please.
		

			So I myself do not have any books on the Ottoman Empire yet. I say yet, because I do have a goal
within the next two years to start producing books on this topic.
		

			One of the big problems we've had with English literature is that we don't have that much books on
the Ottoman Empire.
		

			But this is changing, I'm doing the three books I've gotten ahold of recently that have been
published in the past two years, that are phenomenal works on the Ottoman Empire. So one is the it's
called the last Ottoman heritage by Steph Charis so he's a Greek convert to Islam, who traces the
Ottoman history of Greece, many people don't realize Greece was part of the Ottoman Empire for 300
years. So it's phenomenal work. Another one is Sudan Abdulhamid the second the last great Ottoman
Sudan by Mohammed Harbor, Sultan Abdul Hamid, the second was not the last Ottoman Sudan, but he was
the last great Ottoman Sultan, he was the one who opposed Zionism, and prevented the establishment
		

			of Israel. And he did a lot of other important things. And he was really the last last hope for the
font for the Ottoman Empire. So his biography is another beautiful work. And then a more recent one
that I think just came out last year, is a translation of a Turkish book
		

			by the author ill, or T Lee, who is a, he's a history professor in Istanbul, Turkish history
professor in Istanbul. And the English translation of his book is called discovering the Ottomans.
By discovering Ottomans. It's a beautiful works a short book, it's just about 150 pages, but it's
beautiful. He just goes through like a snapshot of the most important things about the Ottoman
Empire. Moving on to my own work, right? So show my history cause Hamdulillah.
		

			Three years ago, when the pandemic started, and are sitting in lockdown, what am I going to do with
my time sitting at home in the lockdown. So I decided, You know what, I will just record some
history videos and put them together as a course, is honestly only expected like 30 or 40, people
will end up studying it. But I just did it anyway, because nobody had done it before. And I spent
about 10 months putting together this course on the history of Islam. And to my surprise, and
because of Allah, which I'm very grateful for over 1700 people have taken the course to date. And
this course is called history of Islam.
		

			If you go to my website, Islamic self help.com It's the first thing you will see at the top of the
website as my number one bestseller.
		

			fascinating thing with this course is when I was putting it together, I was going to do two hours on
the Ottoman Empire. And when I actually did my research because I can see this there's not much
available in English on the topic. So when I actually did my research, I was surprised at how much
exists on the Ottoman Empire and how much we don't know about your ottoman empire.
		

			At the end of the day, if you if you study my course have over eight hours on the Ottoman Empire. So
the course is 30 hours long, including the Sierra the whole about Rashidi obedience to a passage
Islamic Spain. The accomplishments of most
		

			Some scientists and eight hours on the Ottoman Empire which I myself did not set out to do it was
just that while researching for my videos I kept discovering more and more about the Ottomans and
was shocked that none of this knowledge is available in English