Mohammed Hijab – Reasons People Leave Islam

			At one point, look, there really doesn't mean much. Maybe it means it sold 25 in a day or three in a
day, but you know, I think you'd become a social media point of view is I think most people that
have that, would you call it? That kind of ranking? would do a bit more. I know, you'd be surprised.
You'd be surprised. But handily was good. It was good to showcase that, you know, on the top 10
books at a certain period of time, under that category, there was an Islamic book articulating a
positive and rational and, you know, compassionate case for Islamic theism. Here's the question,
when was the last time that happened? Well, that's why I wrote the book. Right? Because one of the
		

			gaps was, there's no literature on this issue. I mean, there were some, but I don't think there were
adequate from that point of view, although they didn't catch up to the to, you know, our current
times what I mean by current times, past 18 years or so. Because post 911 there's been a different
narrative, which is the new atheist movement, although is dying down a bit. Yeah. But nevertheless,
you have, you know, secular trends on campuses, it's affecting the hearts and minds of, of Muslims
and non Muslims. Incredible, isn't it? Because I was reading. I was looking at some Pew Research
information. When I went to New York and stuff. I want to see what the demographics were like in
		

			terms of Muslims in America. Yes. And it said that 23% of Muslims would apostate in America,
obviously, they have like that there's limitations to the sample size. Except, yeah, of course.
Absolutely. anecdote. Well, it's, it's it's not cluesive. Yeah, but there's something there's
something there, isn't it even for my personal experiences, when I travel the world go up and down
the country, I speak to Muslims and non Muslims. And these trends are they're, you know, ideas about
science, and you know, the kind of basic false assumptions that you know, we have science now is
working, therefore, God is not necessary, which is fallacious. And you have to unravel these
		

			assumptions and have decent discussions with people and teach them about their own tradition
sometimes. Yeah. So
		

			yeah, the the trend is there. And we have we have a duty was awful. I do believe, though, I do
believe that.
		

			Maybe 90% has nothing to do with intellectual arguments. The intellectual arguments for me are
sometimes maybe not an excuse, but they're just secondary. What's happening at the root core is
social stuff, for example, the development of the social norm, right? social psychologists talk
about informational social influence, and normative social influence, this is based on our need to
belong, and our need to feel certain. So if I'm not certain about something, because I have a need
for certainty, I'm going to go to the masses, right? And on, you know, unfortunately, in our kind of
space, it's secular ideas, like, rejection of the Divine, in some sense, yeah. Now, if I, for
		

			example, have a need for bit to belong, and I don't find that belonging in my immediate group, for
example, or subgroup, I'm going to go again to the masses. So if I'm, if I'm a Muslim, when you're
on university campus, and have a need for certainty, and my search is getting challenged, right, and
I don't have any certainty anymore in my tradition, then I'm going to go to the masses for that,
right? Because as a human need, also have a need to belong, and not connected to, you know, my
subgroup. Right? Right. I'm going to connect to the bigger group and generate that bigger group
sometimes is an irreligious group. Yes, I'm not saying the evil or anything, what I'm saying this is
		

			just the nature of how social norms are developed. So is literally based on two things need to
belong, and need to feel certain. So when we try to articulate Islam in the public sphere, we need
to create a sense of belonging, and a sense of certainty, a sense of certainty is probably easy.
This is a bit harder, because you have to be compassionate, and you have to make them realize that
you don't become an ethno religious cult, because that's the wrong type of belonging that you know,
like, exactly like a sect, essentially, yeah. So essentially, what you want to do is, show them that
you can be connect with people who share the same ideas and values as you but at the same time, you
		

			can connect to the bigger group, and you know, connect with your brothers and sisters in humanity,
whether they're religious or not, is irrelevant. But it has to be done in a kind of modern current
context. Anyway, the point is, we need to focus on belonging in certainty. And certainty doesn't
always mean intellectual certainty. It could be existential certainty, things that does feel right.
sense of being because think about it. sambro itself for me is not a belief. Here's a controversy.
It's not a belief, if you mean a belief in a philosophical sense, because beliefs, according to
philosophers could be mundane. I believe this is a microphone. Oh, wow. How does that affect my
		

			being how I relate to the world? It doesn't affect anything. It's a microphone. There's a human
being, there's a ceiling. There's the floor. Do you see my point?
		

			is some is more than a belief. It's a form of knowing that changes your state of being meaning
affects what you know.
		

			What you feel in your heart, what you have in your heart and how you react and really in the world,
that's a different kettle of fish. And that's why language is very important when you are taking it
in a song to people because I say to people, it's some sort of belief. It's actually a form of
knowing that changes what you think, how you feel, and how you relate in the world. So it's a, it's
a different kettle of fish, all those things are existential things. For example, I can give you the
beliefs or the abstract knowledge of my mom's cooking, right? This how you cook a good moussaka dish
Greek dish here. And I can give you all the recipes and how she does it. But I'm telling you, you
		

			knowing how to do it won't make you taste my mom's cooking, for you to know what mom's cooking
tastes like, you have to come over and enjoy the cooking. So there's a difference between abstract
knowing and how you relate to the world. And Islam affects how you relate to the world. Because
sometimes I can have a conviction about something, bro. And I could never articulate it. I was gonna
say 100%, what you're saying it's more on the lines of like subjective experience, first person
subjective experiences. But it's more in line with the concept of a mind. Because the mind is not
should not be transferred as belief and abstract philosophical sense. Yeah. Because we do, how do we
		

			know what your mind is? It's what you believe what's in your heart and how you react and act in the
world. So Islam is very existential from that point of view. And our dow hasn't focused on that. A
dow in terms of how we outreach to our brothers and sisters in humanity, we usually talk about, I
can prove God exists, I can prove that Mohammed Sonam, is diviner Prophet, therefore you're Muslim?
Well, technically, that doesn't make you a Muslim.
		

			What makes you a Muslim is that you have that at least that intention to worship Allah, the La Ilaha
Illa. Allah there is no deity worthy of worship, except Allah. That is not only a state of belief,
it's a state of knowing that affects something at least you have an intention to worship Allah,
because here's the question, if I said, I believe in Allah, and I believe in His Messenger, but I
will never intend to worship Him. Right?
		

			It's very difficult to call me a Muslim. I'm not doing takfeer, of course. But we vary. If I say, I
will never pray, I will never praise him. I will never do the Shahada again, I would never do
anything. So obviously, this goes into like the whole discussion of diversity, I would want to go
into those classical discussions. But the point I'm trying to say is, let's be real.
		

			This person is never a Muslim in the first place. Exactly. But I don't go into the discussions. My
discussion is more of an existential one, right? So, you know, we want to show people that Islam
changes state of being now how does this relate to certainty as we just spoke about earlier, because
certainty is not just about abstract proofs. certainty is about how you relate to the world because
to be is to be related. For example, what's the personality on a desert island? What does Russia
What does compassion mean on a desert island? Not much, you have to relate to things. And that's why
in Islam, we believe the best the greatest relationship you can ever have, is with the loss of
		

			Hannah Montana, because I'm going to say to you, if an article came across with great deductive
arguments that disproved Islam,
		

			I wouldn't read both of me. Because none of that is going to challenge what I feel in such depth.
When I pray to Allah subhana wa tada to connect with him. And all the other kind of evidences and
experience that had that, if you bring them all together, are far more weight here. Do you see? And
that's an existential relationship here.
		

			And it was it he made a really good point. He said, Look, don't think your your mind your state of
being right. Your how you relate to the world, how you know Islam is true is going to be based on
some abstract deductive argument, because it's someone smarter than you. And I'm doing postgraduate
research now. Yeah. And I'm telling you, we learn we get trained how to play around with premises,
you could give me a really good inductive argument. It could necessarily follow or just tweak
something around. Yeah. Anyway, oh, my God, would you do that? So someone could play around with
those with those premises, and then your conclusion could be totally different. So that's what I
		

			love, as it said.
		

			It's almost a bit. It's like an innovation to have in mind through this route only. There must be an
he concludes there must be some kind of experiential aspect, that you have started to pray and
connect to the divine and be related be being that state of being where you have some