Mustafa Umar – The Backpacking Scholar
AI: Summary ©
The Mad Mom Looks and New Roommates discuss their experiences in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, including their first teacher's name and a new roommate's name. They also talk about their experiences living in India and the challenges they face. The speakers discuss their plans to study computer science, their past experiences living in India, and their importance of learning Arabic and the use of fusha in school. They also talk about their educational experience, including their goal of studying Islam at an advanced level and their importance of learning the language before learning it. They emphasize the need for a more structured and informative curriculum for teaching and rewriting, fixing mistakes, and balancing work and school. They also mention their website and website, Cal Islamic University, and their own website.
AI: Summary ©
Assalamu alaikum. Welcome to the Mad Mom Looks.
I'm Mahi and I'm here with my co
host, Sheikh Amir Saeed and Sim. And on
today's show, we welcome Sheikh Mustafa Omer, who
is from the Islamic Institute of Orange County
and is also the founder and director of
California
Islamic University.
Sheikh Mostafa, well, thanks for coming through, man.
Yeah. I know you're here for the Umji
conference, so welcome to Chicago. Thanks for having
me. So I understand you and, Sheikham are
actually, like, roommates or something. Oh, yes. Yes.
Yes. Let me start off by saying this.
When I was in Nadua in Lucknow, India,
Nadu alaamah,
I was there with Sheikh Omar Haqqani,
and I used to see
Sheikh Mustafa
around the campus.
And he was very distinct from everybody else
because I knew I was like dude this
guy has to be a westerner. He looks
different than everybody else. I mean you could
tell his origins are from India or Pakistan
or something. Maimoni originally. Yep. Yep. Yep. So,
he was probably rich.
Well, he owns businesses for sure. Nice. Well,
parents are at least.
So, so so I was like, man, this
guy and Sheikh Omar Haqqani was like, no,
man. You're you're thinking about I was like,
no, dude. I could tell there's something different
about this dude. He's from the western world.
He doesn't really associate with too many people
here. It's just the way he walks, dude.
Just the way he walks. Honestly, the walk
is They walk they could they give it
away. The clothing is even though we're wearing
a soap, we wear it slightly differently. That's
right. You know, so,
and then we finally got a chance to
meet each other,
and
you were
in a room,
and we were talking, and you know, you
were like, yeah, what party are the states
you're from? I found out you were from
the states. Like, yeah, I'm from California, this
and that, we were talking, like, oh, this
is awesome.
And then you were in Networ for a
while, I was in Networ for 1 year,
and then after that, we went our own
separate ways. Yeah. Right?
Who started the fight?
No, there was no fight. We were kind
of just sharing each other's, how it is
over here. Man, it's kinda tough, you know,
this, you know, any other westerners here. There's
another British there are 2 British people there.
Yeah. Yeah. Did you end up living with
Namazi? Right? No. No. I didn't live with
him. Oh, you didn't live with him? Okay.
Okay. Yeah. But we knew him. We knew
him. Yeah. Always Namazi.
It was good to, like, meet an American.
Yeah. Because, like, I was struggling over there,
and it's like, oh, you know that term
misery loves company? I was like, man, at
least I'm not the only one suffering here.
Man, this guy's going through the same thing
that I'm going through. Yeah. And we started
chilling. We're like, wow, this is so cool.
This and you your heart opens up when
you find out someone else is there from
the space. Right? And then, you you build
that bond and everything. That was real nice.
Fast forward,
I
had a friend,
who invited me to Egypt, you know, who
was probably one of my first teachers, Taj.
Remember Taj? Yes. When I was in Mauritania,
I mean, all this is all connected. Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala plans all this we have
no idea. My friend who is a like
in in 2000 and 1, 2002,
Taj, Taj Al Islam from the UK, from
Bradford. Why don't you give out his street
address too? Yeah. No. No. Because he's he
has some initiatives too, so Oh, okay. He's
going public with some stuff. So Cool.
He invites me to Egypt. He goes, come
to Egypt, man. We know you can study
Arabic here. Now I'll still debate. Should I
go to Syria? Should I go here, should
I go to Saudi?
And
he tells me to come to Egypt, I'm
in Egypt in a faraway place called Ismailia
for like 6 months, and then I come
to Cairo
and I find this guy in Cairo. I
had no idea he was in Cairo at
the time. I kind of heard that he
might be there or something. And then we
crossed paths. Was it on the street that
we met? I don't remember now. I remember
the Madid Nasr place we were at.
I was with some guys, like, yeah, hey,
you wanna meet
Mustafa Umar? And I was like, Mustafa Umar
from California? Like, Yeah. And then I went
up to your room and we were and
then we ended up being roommates there. Exactly.
So we lived with each other, I think,
for like 6 months, maybe 4 months. Yeah.
And then
Sheikh Wasallam, he's a backpacker. He's a, masha
Allah, a soldier.
Right? And, I still remember,
you went to University of Sharjah, so check
out the scene over there too, because you
were trying to explore all your options. Yeah.
And that's the thing about Chekhoswama. I'm pretty
sure he carried out through you exhaust he
exhausted all of his options and everything. He
goes to University of Sharjah,
you know, he comes back, you know, he
give us a little bit of feedback how
he likes it and this and that. And
then, Went to Jordan as well. Oh, yes.
He went to Jordan too.
Wow. And, you know, one of the I
think the 2 easiest people I've ever lived
with in my life was yourself and and
Azzam Hashmi. You remember Azzam Hashmi? Yeah. I
remember. Two people who are the easy I've
been through over 40 roommates in my life.
Shout out. From Moritania all the way to
Egypt. The 2 easiest people to live with
is this dude right here,
and Azzam Hashmi, man. And we had a
good time, you know,
very obviously, I'm not gonna praise you too
much for your audience because we don't talk
about it. Sheikh Mustaf, how are you, like,
in here, what, early mid thirties? Mid thirties.
Mid thirties. Okay. So we're all, like, the
same age. Okay. Cool.
He looks a lot younger and has more
than all of us combined. Yeah. Speak for
yourself, dude. I got hair too. I'm sorry?
I got hair like him. What do you
mean? You just wear the hat. Wait. Look
at my hair. Being bald is a new
Is that a Raiders hat? Yeah. LA Raiders.
It's interesting. Okay. You're in the way.
Okay, Marshall.
You
did it for you, for Kelsey. I actually
I don't know. It's gonna You don't know.
Side's dying at me or someone. I I
was thinking about it because I was gonna
wear a white Sox hat, a black and
white white Sox hat Okay. With the Chicago
skyline on it, but I figured I saw
the LA Raiders hat. I'm like, oh, Shakes
from SoCal, yo. I appreciate it. Okay. I
do appreciate it. You know
what I mean? But, like, so you guys
were at Nagwa for, like, a year or
2, kind of? I was there for a
year. I was there for a year as
well. So, like, isn't the alum program like
4 years? Would you get did y'all fight
or something? It is. No. We didn't flunk
at all, actually. There's a with, we had
an interesting time there, let's just say, administratively.
Not that we would get into fights and
get in trouble. But, I me personally,
there was, when I came back to the
states,
let's just say I was
the the organizational
setup,
was kind of working against me. I don't
know what you It's just kinda working against
you. Is what you're saying. Right? Not only
Sloppy was kind of working against you because
they know you're from the states. Yeah. And,
then
the the school is awesome. The school is
phenomenal. The educational level was cool for us
at that time. At that stage, I wasn't
at least. It's kind of what I needed,
but,
that whole thing works against you if you're
American sometimes, especially in India, man. Now you
guys, Sheikh Mustafa said, told me before the
podcast started recording that I wouldn't survive a
day in
Like, why would you say that? Why would
you say that?
Well, I heard you're matching your clothes. You're
you're doing all this stuff. I'm like, you
know what, man? You're you're matching your you
gotta wash your clothes by hand. Yeah. Right?
And I got some stories that just Well,
you you you you guys know, Nihal Khan?
Yes. Yeah. So Nihal's been I think he's
been he's did he graduate? I met Nihal,
okay, before he was going to Nadua. He
stopped by, and I'm like, look. Let me
give you a little pep talk just to
prepare you.
Then I see this,
on what is it? On a virtual mosque
or he posts like on,
on Muslim Matters. Yeah. He posts this thing
and he's like just going crazy. He's miserable.
He's like, why am I here? He's just
complaining. I'm like, this is exactly what I
told the guys. This is exactly what's gonna
happen to you. You know? Yeah. But yeah.
It's it's a part of it. It makes
you stronger, though. And it makes you wiser
to life. But it's changed now. It also
makes you sick. Very sick. It does. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. From firsthand reports. Well, I got
typhoid. So I was in the hospital. I
almost died, actually. I thought that was extinct.
That's what I thought. India. Not India. Right?
Not not India. Over here, the Native Americans,
the Indians here, after I ended with them,
I went to India over there. What?
It reminds me of one of those, diseases
from Oregon Trail. You guys ever played that
game? The guy always dies.
Oregon Trail.
Back when everything was spinach, green, and black,
man. Right.
Oh, snap. No. But anyways yeah. No. So
it it toughens you up though. It toughens
you up. It's it's changed now because all
these students are going now like Nihal and
all. They all live off campus. They got
air conditioning. Masha'Allah.
I was like, air conditioning. We we weren't
even allowed to run the heater. Yeah. Yeah.
And the toilets are all squatty parties, I
take it. Yeah. Well, I I I had
actually a a personal toilet installed. Yeah. Just
a proper American toilet installed. And the moment
I left, they broke it up, and they
just, like, what is this guy doing? Breaking
the snow? Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.
How would you guys compare, like, like, living,
like, in
India, in Lucknow to, like, your experiences in
Egypt?
Man, Egypt's a lot closer to here, living
in Egypt. Yeah. Depending on which area you
live in. But where we live in, we
lived in Losar, man, we were, I mean,
I would prefer it over maybe the apartment
that I lived in in Lombard.
Dang, it's like that, Yeah, I mean, my
apartment in Lombard by no means is awesome.
Yeah. But I mean, it's nice,
obviously cheaper, it's more vast.
One thing you'll realize is when you get
an apartment that's furnished in Egypt, furniture sometimes
is actually pretty nice. Like when I moved
after my wife, after I got married, and
in 2008 I went to Egypt.
Wait, does it have that gaudy, old Yeah.
Yeah. They do. Trim that all over That's
exactly trademark air furniture. Yeah. Yep. Yep. It's
very it's very gaudy like that. Yeah. Yeah.
With the cushions and stuff. So I want
to ask you, Sheikh Mostafa. So you, like,
you did your undergrad here in Cal in
UC Irvine. Yeah. UC Irvine. And then you
you first went to the dupe ever stood
like work in the field of computer science?
I worked as a programmer. Yeah. Okay. So
how old were you roughly when you kind
of went overseas for the first time? That's
a good question. Like, it it was the
year after I graduated. So whatever year that
was. Alright. So you did a year and
then you kinda you you balanced. Yeah. 2003.
Okay. Okay.
No doubt. And then
Sharjah, Jordan, US and you went to France,
I think, was it? Or Europe or something?
I forgot about that. Yeah. Yeah. So basically,
I go I go Nadua. Yeah. From Nadua,
I go to Egypt. From Egypt, check out
Jordan, check out Sharjah, and then end up
in France for 3 years in France. So,
like, that sounds pretty interesting.
Did you have an agenda in mind? Like,
okay, I wanna, like, learn this in this
place and then do that for a couple
years or No. So basically, my parents were
always telling me that the one thing that
they really disliked about my travels
was is that I'm not sticking to one
program. So they're like, where are you gonna
be? Where are you going now? Like, I
just told them. I'm like, like, you keep
on asking me for this long term program.
I don't have a program because when I
go to one place, I'm like, this is
not the place for me. I gotta go
somewhere else. So I told them I'm on
1 month plans. So I'll tell you where
I'm gonna be, which country I'm gonna be,
which part of the world for this month.
And then when I'm about to leave for
another place, I'll let you know I'm gonna
be there for another month. And he's not
exaggerating. I didn't eavesdrop on any of his
conversations,
but I I kinda knew when he was
talking to his parents and that he's not
exaggerating. That's kinda how that's what I'm saying.
He's a backpacker, dude. He's a soldier. That's
how he is. He lives one month at
a time. He doesn't have high expectations of
any place, I think. I I lost all
my expectations. Yeah. One guy I I kept
going to places, and they're like, it didn't
live up to my expectations. Someone gave me
good advice. He's like, you know what? He's
like, this new place you're going now, he's
like, have you lowered your expectations? I said,
I've completely lowered my expectations. He said, you're
still gonna fail. I said, why? So because
you're not supposed to have any expectations when
you go to this place. I'm like, okay.
I got it man. I got it. Yeah.
So I went with that philosophy basically, you
know. Yeah. That's kinda what happened in Egypt,
you know. So when I was in Egypt,
after a year I started started, you know,
talking to people like Amer and stuff like
that and started complaining that, you know, I'm
getting tired of, like no one speaks Fosseh
Arabic, like the proper classical Arabic. I'm trying
to learn that. One of the reasons why
you go into an Arab country hoping that
you're gonna kinda absorb the Arabic language Mhmm.
So you you don't have to just keep
studying it all the time and advancing in
the language. And I'm just sitting there. I'm
like, everyone keeps speaking amia, darrajah, this, you
know, clock wheel language and all that. So
I meet this guy in in Egypt. You
probably met him. His name was Hassan al
Banda. Yeah.
Oh. And he's like, oh. Yeah. Yeah. So
hold on. Different Hassan al Banda. So this
is a Bengali,
a Bangladeshi
Hassan al Banda.
He's like.
That's the one from the late thirties and
Yeah. Yeah. A different totally different one. Right?
For those who don't know, we're we're laughing
about Hassan al Banda was the the founder
of the Muslim Brotherhood. Yeah. Yes.
So this guy is named after him. Right?
So he's not an Egyptian. He's a Bengali
guy named Hassan al Banna. He's from England.
From the UK. A pretty well known personality.
Founder of Awakening Media and all that. The
founder of Awakening Media. Exactly. You know, he's
doing his PhD at Azhar. Azhar. So he's
a nice guy. I'm talking to him and
everything. I spent some time with him. And
I started complaining and he's like, I'm just
sick of you complaining, you know, all the
time. I just when I get to know
someone really well, I feel like I open
up to them, you know. So that's why
I complained a lot to Amir, you know.
Yeah. So I come start complaining to Hassan,
and he's like, you know what, man? If
you wanna learn Arabic, you wanna hear, like,
fusha pure Arabic. I'm like, yeah. I heard
it's it's not in Medina. It's not in
Mecca. It's not in Jordan. It's not in
Syria. I'm like, where can you go in
the world for this? He's like, honestly, there's
only one place I witnessed in my life
that has, like, more fusha than you'll find
anywhere else in the world. I said, well,
what is this? He says, look. This is
school in France
and he says, I'm not exaggerating. I he's
in the PhD program at Azhar. I've heard
in in 6 months at Azhar,
I have heard more classical fus high Arabic
in 1 month in France than I've heard
in Azhar.
And I'm like,
I'm going to this place. Like, I I
don't care what this I gotta check this
place out. That's that's it could be. Right?
Yeah. So I have I go in with
no expectations.
Like, as soon as I found out,
I packed my bags. I I left I
left myself in Egypt too. Just jumped on
a plane and I flew to France. I'm
like, let me check this place out, you
know. So
you know, I visit visited the place. He
was absolutely right. I mean, you're ordering your
food in fusha. Right? You go to the
administration.
The guy's a graduate. He's gonna register you,
and he's speaking fusha. So I'm like, this
is much easier. Environment for you. And I
think there's a penalty for speaking English or
something. They had that in the past. Okay.
Yeah. But generally because the thing is the
reason why it's like this, all these Muslim
students are from different parts of Europe. So
they're all Europeans. They're all Westerners for the
most part. Standards are different. It's gonna be
a little bit nicer to you know, they're
a little bit more serious about the deen
because of their context and all that. So
they all come from all these countries. So
some of them speak Italian. Some of them
speak German. Some of them speak Spanish. You
know? So they speak French.
So the only All these people are speaking
from all these different backgrounds. They they probably
got their own accent
in their Fusha Arabic. Right? Or are they
speaking perfect? They get perfect be because that
it's their it's not their native tongue. Right?
So what happens is because they learn Arabic
at the school, the accent and the style
is gonna be exactly what they learn in
the school, which is Fusha, which is the
proper Arabic. It's the only, like, you know,
medium of communication that we have. So this
was awesome. So I'm like, this is for
Arabic, this is, like, perfect for me, you
know. So I try it out and,
it works well. And then I'll I actually
look at the Islamic studies part of the
program, and I'm like, this is pretty good,
man. Like, this classes like Islam and philosophy,
Islam and sociology.
You know, we're studying Nietzsche and, like, how
it relates to, you know Stuff like that.
Yeah. It's pretty dope. Comparing it. He's very
sarcastic.
I know. I know. So I've been in
I've been in into philosophy and all these
things. So, like, these teachers understand that, you
know, as them being European Muslims,
they need to go through all of this
stuff. So I'm like, this is a place
for me. Like, I like to go through
this program, and it's a packed program. It
was perfect because I I like things to
be very in-depth and fast. I don't have
a lot of time when I eventually get
back to America.
Right? So they just canceled this, they had
a 6 year program, they condensed it to
5 years. So I'm like, this is perfect.
So I skipped the 1st 2 years, so
I just got 3 years left. So now
it's like a ton of classes, 16 classes
in 1 year. I'm like, this is people
are getting crazy. They're like, oh, this is
overwhelming. I can't handle this. I'm like, this
is perfect for me. This is exactly this
is what I wanted. You know? I wanna
study on the weekends. I wanna get out
of here, finish my Islamic studies, continue on,
you know, with the rest of my life.
So And you're a big reader. You love
books. I remember we used to go to
library to Dar es Salaam library. Dar es
Salaam Egypt, not Dar es Salaam Saudi. Yes.
We used to go to the library a
lot. And one thing you have to know
about, Musa Umar is that he is a
very big reader, and he loves reading. He
loves the depth. I found out after you
were there
from I forgot who it was. It may
have been Fahim or somebody. They were like,
he's working the library too on the spare
time. Yeah. I was like, wow. What a
what a what a perfect setup you have.
You're working around books. Yeah. And then,
I take it that
you use that as your
advantage because you have a hidden agenda to
have as many books you can be surrounded
and sleep on books. That's that's I don't
love, man. That's, that was the best experience
in my life. Yeah. Because when you work
in the library, I'm like, yeah, you know
what? You got you guys library is not
very organized. Let me organize the whole thing
for you. So so I got an opportunity.
While I'm organized, I get to flip through
all the books and kind of check out
who the authors are, what is this book
about. You kinda get a experience on all
of this stuff. So it was it was
really nice. Don't you guys just have ebooks
that you can just put on your This
this was 2,005,
2,006.
If you have ebooks. Right. There's nothing like
holding a real book though. And and honestly,
it's true. It's true. Ebooks is just Look,
I'm a I'm a tech guy. You know,
I've always been a computer science major. Ebooks
are cool when you're, like, traveling on airplanes.
You don't have to carry stuff. Yeah. But
there is a feeling to books Yeah. That
it it just can't be taken away. And
being surrounded by books, especially, like It has
a feeling. Those times when you're traveling or
moving from apartment part in Egypt, and you
have all your books in one room, and
you just look at it, and you're like,
oh, I got a few more hours. You
start flipping through all your books. There's no
no better feeling in the world than that.
Absolutely. There's no better feeling in the world.
Absolutely. Now at this time, you weren't married
at all? No. I was not married. That's
probably, that's that's probably why I Yeah. Yes.
Yes. And this was in what city in
France is this place? This so this is
in central France. It's a city called Chateau
Chienon, which, is like Chateau Chienon is the
nearest village. This place is literally in the
middle of a forest.
And that's that's why I loved it because
India, like, where I was in Lucknow,
just the noise and the pollution and it
it was very difficult. Like, it's spiritually draining.
Egypt, traffic, all you hear is, you know,
Beqya. The guy is, like, covered with comes
on a donkey. Anyone who's been to Egypt
would be smiling right now. Yeah. Exactly. Anyone
who's been there, like, you know, this guy
comes and just weird stuff going on. Right?
And it it drains you because you're trying
to I'm on a mission to learn Islam
and also kind of like improve my spirituality
connection with Allah, kind of come back to
the fitra and all that.
Being in the middle of a forest, it's
it's beautiful, it's natural, just nature. You don't
have people around you, pretty much few farmers
like a little bit distance and all that.
It's spiritually rejuvenating.
And one thing for our listeners, they should
understand that, you know,
he's not he's not talking down upon, you
know,
The studies in Egypt, but he's a special
breed of people He has to have everything
and it's very you're a very systematic person.
I remember the first book that you showed
to me in Arabic Thaxton's
I use that to teach now, but I
don't show them the real book. Yeah. People
look at that. They're like, this is crazy.
Yeah. You showed me that system. And he's
showing it to me and I'm showing it
to you. What is this? It's it's it's
the author. His name is Thaxton. John Thaxton.
No. No. Wheeler. Wheeler m Taxton. It's it's
a basically a book that they teach,
Koranic and classical Arabic at Harvard University 2nd
year. Mhmm. Right? Yeah. So
he's he's going through he's and I'm slow.
I'm a Neanderthal.
Right? So he's trying to show me all
this, and I'm nodding my head. I'm showing
showing enthusiasm.
And while he's showing this to me, I'm
like, oh my god. I'm never gonna be
able to use this book. I'm like, yo.
This is such an awesome book, Ralph. Let
me borrow it sometimes.
Okay. After all these years, I find out
there's fake false enthusiasm there. Let's get to
it, man. You were so emotional, man. I
don't wanna tell you. No. I'm just joking.
No. But well, he the and one thing
I realized from that point on, you're a
very systematic dude. Yeah. And you have very
high expectation, which is good,
for your environment in order to flourish and
in order to blossom in in in the
Islamic sciences.
So that was very perfect for you, you
know, and everything happens where Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala, obviously, you know this better than I
do, put you through all those things because
you had to go through that grueling process
and finally you found the forest. Right? Yeah.
I do have a quick question. So like
this place in France Yeah. Do a lot
of Americans, like people who students who wanna
study overseas, it's like totally like I'll tell
you why. The Europeans know more about it.
Americans don't know too much about this. Yeah.
Almost no Americans know about it. Even even
most Europeans don't know about it. They don't
advertise very well. But I'm the first American
to graduate from this program. The second American
was Sheikh Adam Jamal who's actually in, he
works for Bayana now in in Texas. We
live with him too in Egypt. There you
go. Right? So he's the 2nd guy to
go. So this is basically what happened. I
don't wanna tell too much about the story,
but our visas got revoked. So there's a
visa problem in France. They wouldn't give us
a proper visa even though I got the
visa from here, the embassy.
We had to renew our visa every 3
months. Oh, no. And they would just they'd
be like, you know what? We're gonna give
you the 3 month plan. So my parents
were at least happy. Okay. From 1 month
to at least 3 months, he's here. Right?
So 3 months 3 months, you keep renewing.
When I left France, Adam was still studying.
He still had 1 year left. When he's
about to go take his final exams, they
send him finally a notice back and they're
like, we decided not to re renew your
visa. Even though we renewed it for the
last 2 years, we're not renewing your visa.
And that Mustafa guy,
his visa is canceled as well. Like, that
that Mustafa guy left, like, a year ago.
It doesn't matter. His visa is canceled. So,
like, you guys gotta leave. And if you
don't leave, like, the police are gonna come.
And they're like, what the heck? You know?
So so that's the problem is, like, when
if school is awesome, Americans can't go there
now especially with what's going on because they
only get a 3 month visa.
And there's no guarantee. When I tell people,
like, this is a great school, you should
consider it. I I mean, I would love
to recommend it to people. I'm like, are
you willing to take a 3 month sacrifice
where you gotta go there, you gotta pay
a full year's tuition,
and you gotta know that you might get
kicked out after 3 months? Most people are
not willing to make that, you know. So
not everyone's ready to do it, like do
the backpacking thing, you know. So Yeah. Right.
So talk to us a little bit about
this, universe, California Islamic University.
Yeah. So like,
Commerce said, I'm I'm a very systematic type
person. So for me, like, when I was
going through my studies,
you know Are you the founder of this
university? I'm the founder of this university. Yeah.
So we started it,
about almost 4 years ago now. We had
a different name called College of Islamic Studies,
and then we changed the name recently. So
basically what happened was everywhere I go and
and studied,
I was thinking like, you know what? What
am I going through? What was I looking
for? What was I hoping for? And of
course when you look back, like, you know,
10 years 10 years back, you're like, you
know what? I was I had wrong expectations,
or some some of my expectations were correct.
So I went to study Islam.
My goal was to study Islam. My goal
is not to study Arabic. I'm not have
no particular interest in the Arabic culture. I
have no particular interest in the Middle East
or studying in certain lands or or in
this Indian subcontinent. I didn't wanna learn my
roots. I I had none of these intentions.
I just wanted to learn Islam because I
went far from Islam. I don't know if
I ever told you about that, but you
know, I like I left Islam basically when
I was in college. Right? So then hamdullilah,
I came back to Islam, but I need
to know what this this religion is about.
So that's why I started studying. Now when
I get into studies,
they're training
specialized people. It's not to put the programs
down. They're training specialized people, and they're assuming
that people grew up in a Muslim environment
and they have, like, you know, k through
12 Islamic education. Right? I didn't really have
k through 12. I had, like, Sunday school
Islamic education where we just learned the 5
pillars. Yeah. Every year, it's the same thing.
Right? So
so for me, I'm, like, going with a
blank slate pretty much,
few books that I've read. And all of
a sudden we jump into like fiqh and
fiqh is like about, you know, purification water
is here and then, you know, zakah on
the camels and the donkey. And if a
donkey comes and drinks from your water, I'm
like well that's never happened to me. I
would predict that this is probably never gonna
happen to me in my lifetime. So all
these issues that we're spending so much time
focusing on, 1, they're not very spiritually uplifting
because it's kinda dry, legal legalistic in nature.
And 2, it's not practical to me necessarily.
Right? So while while I'm going through this,
I'm looking back at my educational experience and
saying, look, if I had to go through
that whole thing again, what was I looking
for? And I'm not the only person who's
looking for this. Right? Other people wanna learn
Islam too. Of course. So the first thing
I said the first mistake that we're making
when people who are trying to go learn
Islam is go learn Arabic first. So spend
2 years learning Arabic before you can actually
go and learn Islam. Now that that 2
years of learning Arabic in, like, a place
like, you know, Lucknow or it's radically, like,
a hard place to live in from our
standards. Right?
You got no Islamic knowledge
connection with Allah,
spiritual reinforcement to help you get through that.
Yeah. Like, you're sitting in the hospital with
typhoid and you're like, well, I came to
learn Islam.
What can help me through this? Oh, I
don't know any verses of the Quran because
I haven't learned my Arabic yet. I'm still
learning Dahu and Sarf. Right? I'm still going
through, you know, I haven't learned any hadith
that can help me. I haven't learned any
major things from Sira that can connect me
with because I'm so focused on, like, dissecting
the, you know, whether the if the donkey
came and, you know, drank from my water.
Right? So that's the problem. Right? So what
I'm saying is the first thing I said,
we need to flip this model. We need
to teach Islam in English first and either
simultaneously teach Arabic or put Arabic later on.
That's a cool idea. That's the first thing
that and and I'm very, very big on
this. And it it unfortunately,
our culture and our trend is the opposite.
People the first thing people ask me when
they talk about, oh, California Islamic University, oh,
do you guys teach Arabic? I'm like, well,
yes, but you should take the other Islamic
classes first. Like, no. No. I just wanna
learn Arabic.
I'm like, for me,
it's very hard for me to understand that.
I guess they've somehow been have this in
their mind that you can't study you can't
understand Islam at a deep level until you
learn Arabic first. So they wanna go and
jump into Arabic first. Now it's true you
can't be a specialist unless you learn Arabic.
Not to, you know, downplay the importance of
the Arabic language. But this this priorities
like like, you know,
The understanding of priorities in the life of
a Muslim Yeah. Educationally, the same thing happened.
So that's one thing I did. We another
advantage of that is
if someone just gave up Arabic, you know,
that they don't learn anything. Exactly, bro. This
is this is what I'm talking about. You
can you can relate to this. How many
people did we meet in Egypt
that didn't survive more than a year? Yep.
Right? And, you know, I remember Taj was
telling me, he's like, you know what, bro?
I got people
from all over the country, you know, from
England, from all over Europe. They went to
Egypt. They went to Syria. They went to
Jordan. They went to Yemen. They went to
all these places. They're like, we wanna go
learn Islam. It's like, you know, we wanna
go on this rihalla and this journey and
everything.
They they dropped out within 1 year. They're
depressed because now they don't learn anything. They
left some of them left their wife and
kids behind. Their their marriage got messed up
and everything. And they're like, for what? What
what what did I get out of it?
Because they didn't get any Islam out of
it. Yeah, man. They're just they just got
they they got to Ajrumia, like, down, like,
shut up Ajrumia and all that stuff, but
they come back and they got nothing, dude.
So that that's bothers me. Your point is
exactly, like, if you leave after 1 year
or you leave after 6 months, you gotta
have something you've you've come with. Something that's
beneficial for you. Right? So that's that's the
first step. Right? And the second step was
I'm like, look, this curriculum,
the books that we study, the books are
like ancient they're like classical texts. Okay? And
not to deny that there's a benefit in
studying those texts. Yeah. I think those should
be taught at an advanced level. Exactly. Right?
So you you you you break down the
text like the the classical, you know Latin
way of breaking down a text and you
learn how to dissect the wording and what
was the author thinking and all that. That's
advanced studies. That's like masters level type of
stuff. When you're trying to learn your basic
Islamic knowledge
from those same texts, it's not the best
way to go about it. Right? So what
I'm trying to do is It's not relevant
to us now. It's not relevant to us
now. You know, even even the style of
teaching and then the issues that are brought
up are not relevant. Yeah. So I try
to do 2 things. 1, make the style
of books almost like, kinda like these, teach
yourself type books or dummies type books, you
know, where you can learn so many skills
just from these books. Yeah. This is a
huge undertaking. So I'm gonna go and, like,
go through the entire Islamic studies curriculum
and rewrite every single book, you know, from
scratch. Wow. So that's what I've been doing
for the past, like, you know, 2 years.
In what way are you rewriting it? Are
you just making it more,
digestible for western audiences? Or So well, that's
what the rewriting process pretty much is. Because
I need, like, pop up books.
Not there yet. My son has pop up
books. He's 3 years old. Not there yet.
I'm gonna get you those ebooks where they,
like, have, like, 3 d graphics and all
that stuff. You know? Gotta wear your 3
d glasses too. Yeah. Like, at at the
moment, what I'm trying to like, I'll I'll
take, like, a fiqh book, for example. Right?
I'll take, like, a Hanafi fiqh text. Like,
let's say Iqtiya, which is what you study
in Azhar. Right? So I'll go to that
book and, with other references and all that.
I'll rewrite the entire book in I'll reorganize
chapters in terms of, well, which one should
come first? You know? You can't study one
topic, like for example, let's say,
the chapter on ghusl. Right? Bathing, taking a
bath. Right? It talks about, you know what,
you need ghusl,
when you're entering into Makkah for Hajj at
a specific point in the mikat and all
that stuff. So, you're going for Arafa, you
take Oz. But the thing is a person
who's never doesn't know what Arafa is. Right?
And they're going through this and they're in
the first chapter. They've not covered Hajj yet.
Yeah. So instead, I take I take that
issue out and I put it into the
chapter on Hajj. Beautiful. Right? And I take
certain issues that are kinda split around in
different chapters, put them where they need to
be in terms of sequential order where this
is where you would learn this first, you
learn this next, and you're not got a
bunch of questions in your head. Because otherwise
you just got a ton of questions which
are not you haven't been introduced to that
subject yet. Of course. So that's one thing
I did. I rearranged the things, gave more
explanation because like a lot of things that
we studied there wasn't really much explanation. If
you had an awesome teacher,
everything makes sense. But if you don't have
an awesome teacher you're like what's this doesn't
even what's the point of this? Yeah. Look
what I have one question I have for
you is what would you do is like
for instance when it comes to zakat and
you know or or even just trading
like dates with rice or rights with dates.
Exactly. How do you remedy that? Like this
is what I've done. So I've done 2
things like let's take zakah. It's like all
the zakah on animals and stuff like that,
I threw it into an appendix.
We don't cover it. So you should know
that it exists. That is true. So it's
an appendix and I'm like look if I'm
like here's the minimum. You got more than
you got 5 or more camels,
and they're grazing freely for most of the
year. Right? So you're not feeding them. That
principle is important to know in zakah. But
then the whole chart and memorizing I remember
I studied with 1, you know, Sheikh from
Yemen. We I think we went might have
gone together. He's breaking down, like, the 2
year Bint Mahal. The like, this is the
with Laboon. I'm like, woah, man. And he's
like, yeah. You have to memorize all this.
I'm like, really? You have to memorize all
this stuff. You know? So I threw all
this in appendix,
and then I'm like, look. 401 k retirement
accounts, IRA accounts, Roth IRA accounts, these are
things that people are asking about zakah, you
know. Can zakah go to masjids? Can zakah
like, what what what is a zakatable, you
know, asset? What, what organization is zakah eligible?
Stuff like that. So putting more emphasis on
that, bringing contemporary issues into that, that's what
I'm trying to do. Right? Beautiful. When it
comes to fickle bull. Right? You're trading 2
objects, you know, rice or whatever it is.
Change it around and make sure that
contemporary issues like investing in the stock market,
selling
stock short
or versus selling long and stuff like that.
Which aspects play a role in riba? Because
this is what we want to know as
people and this is what imams need to
know as well. Of course. You know unfortunately
we don't get trained in stuff. And and
I know this may be slightly switching. Yeah.
But how are you balancing between this and,
being the the scholar,
resident scholar
in in your masjid at the same time?
So it's it's tough because you're playing a
bunch of roles. Yeah. So I'm teaching these
classes and then I'm running the school as
well. So doing administrative stuff and then being
like the imam with counseling and then leading
the Khutba and all that stuff. Also, Hanala,
you do the counseling and stuff too? Yeah.
I do all that stuff, the youth work
and then give talks like Islam 101 talks
and do interfaith work as well here and
there. So you obviously you work 7 days
a week? Yes. And I would say you
work easily over 70 hours a week. That's
an understatement. Understood. I don't know how to
look, but what a piece. Sheikh Mustafa, where
can people find out more about the, the
university?
There's a website calislamic.com.
Okay. So cal islamic.com.
We've tried to nickname our school Cal Islamic
because we in California, we have school called
Cal Poly, California Polytechnic,
and then we got Cal Cal Tech. Yeah.
Very famous school. Of course. So, like, there's
a Cal Tech. There's a Cal Poly. There's
a Cal Baptist. There's a Cal Lutheran. Yeah.
Wanna have a Cal Islamic? Oh, nice. California
Islamic University and throw a nickname out there.
Hopefully, it catches on, you know? Wow. Much
I love it. And as we wrap up,
where can people find out more about you,
your institute, and, engage with you, like, on
social media, etcetera?
So I got Facebook. I got Twitter. I
got Instagram. I got my own website, Mustafa
Omar dotcom. And, just by visiting, calisalami.com,
or Islamic Institute of Orange County's website, they
can reach out to me. And, I'm very
responsive to emails as well, when people contact
me because I used to contact a lot
of shirk and,
most of them don't respond to me. Like,
with all due respect, I understand but, like,
it used to bother me. So I respond
to every single person whoever tries to I
buy your own. On your own? On my
own. Yeah. Yeah. So you don't have that
team? I would love to have a team.
Would you I knew you'd like to be
on my team. The reason why I asked
that is because a lot of times people,
they feel that it's disingenuous even though it's
a right of people who are very busy
and business owners or scholars who are very
busy. They have a team that kinda respond
for them. The only team that responds for
me is I also run a prison outreach
program. So we have our our classes in
prisons across America actually.
So I get letters from prison about like
50 a month.
And I have a team who actually writes
those and I just review the responses, make
sure that everything's accurate Islamically.
Those are the only ones. But my own
emails and all that stuff, phone calls, I
answered all of my stuff. Okay. After you
told me the prison thing, I know you're
working over a 100 hours a week. I
know that for sure now. Yeah. May Allah
reward you, man. You're obviously an inspiration for
all of us and obviously being a roommate
and a friend, a distant friend, you know,
you make us all very proud. And I
think it's all it's it's something that's gonna
give us all some drive, Insha'Allah. I really
mean that. I really mean that. Mashallah. May
Allah. Yeah. I mean, we see you and
give you bark on your work. I mean
And it's time to eat some nahari and
chicken tikka right now. I'm done. I did
a 12 week diet, so I'm prepared for
this. I deserve this. We are gonna love
that game. Now. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I
was, mesmerized by the YouTube videos of yours,
but now you look a lot skinnier. So
Yeah. I mean, you look nice then too.
Don't worry. Yeah.
We got more in shape. He's gotta catch
a flight. Alright. The chef has gotta catch
a flight. Okay. And we gotta feed him,
because it's his cheat meal week.
Shit. Cheat meal after 3 months. Yeah. So
You're like a lot of credit check. Most
of our coming through. Exactly. Yeah, man. It
was really a good treat having you here.
Hopefully, you can give us some feedback on
the studio and our and the way we
run things here. We can get some While
we eat. Too. While we eat. While we
eat. Of course. Of course. Absolutely. That's not
that's not gonna be for the public to
hear. Sure. For our listeners out there, if
you have any questions or comments, you can
email us at [email protected].
You can like our Facebook page. Follow us
on Twitter. We're on Instagram. Give us a
5 star rating on iTunes.
Subscribe on Itunes or Podcast Addict if you're
on Android. For our special guest, Sheikh Mustafa
Omar and my co hosts, Sheikh Amir Saeed
and Sim. I'm Maheem for the Mad Mamluks,
signing off.