Dismantling Atheism

de la salud salam ala Rasulillah. While it was like they sent him sympathy a lot, actually I didn't ask for it. It was very good to go.

I guess unless I hear otherwise said I'm gonna have to lie but I got to

the lower very happy for our special guests this week for Friday Night Lights.

We have with us in Amsterdam and honey from Michigan, who Charlotte arrow will be joining us for this this topic of atheism, which is a topic that he has been researching for and teaching for a number of years now. So a quick bio about moms today, man. He's the Director of Academic Affairs at emotive Institute. He hails from Michigan.

And he's a resident scholar there. And he earned a master's degree from the University of Jordans College of Shediac, ranking first in his class and a master's degree from Harvard University, where he studied religions philosophy, political science, and psychology. And over the past decade, he served as an Imam and community leader in Michigan and so we're very happy to have you welcome.

And he teaches actually a course through an amalgam of called Science God, atheism and the pursuit of truth so he's is that the title? That's perfect, right? So and he's taught this material to hundreds of students that hamdulillah so we look forward to picking his brain. As for the gentleman on my left than his bio is well known. He's the lion of the Sunnah he is shipped commodities our Imam here at Clear Lake Islamic Center, welcome, Chef, come on.

Welcome. So this is a topic that just from the get go show, what made you decide to to really research this topic, and I spent so much time actually, you know, preparing and presenting on this topic of atheism?

And what did you do to prepare and I saw Shama showed me just two days ago, your your notes were like 500 pages, that's what the student gets? Yes. So anytime the student gets 500, that means you have at least 2000 somewhere

that a coffee come? So to answer the first question, a number of factors, the first being that

the first time I was introduced to philosophy, I, I appreciated some things about it that I felt were not taught in maybe traditional Islamic Studies, curriculum, including, and specifically epistemology, theory of knowledge, how do you know what you know? Emphasis on critical thinking emphasis on strengthening your evidences your arguments, picking everything apart, challenging biases, I saw some good things in it. However, of course, the first time I was introduced to it, it was on the basis of the topic of ducts Shibu, hot, and everything that I had studied in awfully the classes felt like or sorry, some of what I had studied in it, the classes felt like it was

irrelevant to what people are actually asking about to the questions people had on the ground in the US, Canada, UK, wherever around the world, and even questions that people had on the ground. The obvious question, starting with comparative religions, why Islam, but in terms of philosophy of religion, the question of existence, the question of the being of God, the question of the general question of how do you know God exists? What are the proofs for the existence of God? How do you know the universe is not? is finite or infinite questions like this that come up? Pretty much for most people who now are studying in western universities and nowadays, even some Muslim majority

countries in their universities as well? Is this a trend that you feel is gotten more intense? Check them out? Or when you were in university? Was this also something that was very prevalent? No, back then. This was like 30 years ago.

It wasn't a big deal back then. Wasn't really, it wasn't like how it is today, where it just even some people who are not atheists will say they're atheists to kind of indicate that they're rational and logical. And

10 years ago, I got an invitation from someone to come to the American University in Cairo, because he said, a lot of the Muslims are saying they're atheist. And we need a lecture in English about atheism, you know, so, and then he says, I know a lot of them aren't deep down, but they're saying it that indicates that they're, you know, intellectuals and that's how it's marketed. Unfortunately, you know, marketing is everything. You market something like it's for smart people, even if it's dumb. It goes the truth.

Okay, I got something this is going to be an interview of you basically, it looks like

so, there are there I want to know

What you personally feel about atheists, atheists people.

There's a one of my good friends and famous speaker that we all know I don't want to give too many clues. But there's why and ACU and the initials. And we had this discussion and he, he believes that you cannot change the atheist, he has something called the two minute rule, speak to them for two minutes, and then move on because you can't change them. Shaha modernI we're in agreement that no, they don't have a strong argument. And they're not that solid, because there have nothing to really stand on. And they're not that difficult. And we know people who are atheists and became Muslim and even atheists who became Christian. So, where are you on this? Are you in the middle? Are you on one

side? Or the are you on our team?

That's the first thing I'll say is you really better obscuring names. You're known for it, Mashallah.

I never heard of this Two Minute Rule. But I actually have seen Doctor Yes. And may Allah reward him a number of occasions, I reached out to him years ago for people in the community who needed help, or were struggling with faith or atheists as well, who wanted to talk, he spent a good amount of time talking to them. So he broke his own two minute rule. Well, here's what I think I wasn't there when he mentioned this Two Minute Rule. But I assume that like you would assume that every case is different, that if you if you see from the very beginning, someone does not want to talk, and they're not generally curious. They're not looking for evidence, they're just looking to argue, I

agree that for some cases, from the very beginning, you can tell that this is not really going anywhere. And perhaps that's what he meant by the two minute rule. I do believe we should give people a chance to have that conversation. If in your conversation with that person, there's no indication that they're genuinely curious than Yeah, in two minutes, one minute, one sentence in an email may suffice to show or maybe no response whatsoever in an email that this person doesn't want to see any proofs this person just wants to argue along. So I don't know where I'd be on that spectrum. But I see what Sheltie acid is saying, and I think it has a context. And I also see what

you're saying it has its own content. And just for the record, I was talking about a guy called the Sen Qureshi. Okay. Yeah, see, encourage. All right.

Another thing.

Actually, go ahead. I lost it. I had I had a second one I was I was gonna ask. So you mentioned that it's pretty much rising. Why is it rising? And what can parents do? I just spent, you know, just a couple of days ago, I was speaking to a,

you know, a high school student who was basically saying, I'm doubting Islam, all of my friends are kind of becoming atheist, like, almost like, there's a wave. And so this is what I feel like doing at this point in time. To be honest, answering this question would take an entire weekend. So I would actually urge those who are genuinely curious to like, read a book about a topic from an authentic source, attend the class that we have through and Melody signs on God atheists in pursuit of truth, it is a long topic and you're right, she has come out of the 500 pages. That was after I condensed it like two or three times over, I have a lot more notes. But I mean, your mashallah the

Blackboard Dharma for those who don't know, so. So I'm assuming you have a lot of notes as well. And you can see how there really are a lot of facets to consider. One thing that I can say is that amongst the, let's say, top 10 causes for this, it's important to know where this started, this trend started. It's not new in terms of its origins. It's also not ancient, in terms of how prevalent it was, this is in the last few 100 years. This is when Christianity as an authority lost its position in the world for a number of understandable reasons. And it was replaced with what is known as the age of enlightenment or if you will, the age of darkness, depending on how you're

looking at it, where God was replaced with man and the human condition was reconsidered afterlife was ignored and sacred spaces were replaced in society. In general, the way that people talk the way that people converse, the things that you see in public, it was replaced with a more secularized and secularized here in one context, secularized perspective on what matters and what really matters, in that case is myself, my desires. So what became the new deity and then you got is essentially the whole and in the knifes, and for many people, this is one of the causes, so that ended up leading to many movements, many trends, many of the isms you hear about if you haven't studied them, they

really stem from that change in society, starting in Europe and basically spreading worldwide. And that's why today we see many people struggling with different aspects of let's say faith or doubts. Oftentimes, when we get to the core of what the issue is, the person does not know how to reason. So the way that they are reasoning is by starting with enough's, that what really matters most the core of everything is my desire as a deity. Now they might not worship it like we worship, but for some people, the deity is everything or the desire is everything. And Allah subhana does address these people write a photo item and he Takada Allah who will haha. So when we look at the causes for some

people, maybe a motional verse means do you see do you see the one who took his

ILA is deity as his house, his desires as His deity. Just a quick example, I should have lit it, sorry. So essentially, for everyone, it's a different reason when we have these conversations one on one, and that's what I generally prefer, I don't like the public debates, I don't think that they've been very fruitful, at least not for me, I know it's subjective. And other people have done a great job having these public debates. But for me, personally, I really enjoy the one on one conversations, humanizing them and understanding what it is that this person believes about people. So you find, for example, some people had emotional trauma, right. And they have used that too, as a

justification for abandoning faith or they were hurt by a Muslim, that an actual rights was violated, or it's a matter of, you know, desires, whatever I want, goes, and that's one form of liberalism today, where people are worshiping their desires, whatever I desire, whatever I think makes me happy, even if it doesn't, is what I pursue. And that's utilitarianism. Other people are angry at why they're suffering in the world. That's the problem of evil. Other people think that today, people are modern and advanced, and everyone else of religion is ancient and backwards and archaic and violent, when obviously, this, this is a myth that's been debunked so many times. So for

every individual, it's different. But ultimately, there is, there is a spiritual issue. And that's the fitrah. That's the internal state of water. But what's interesting is you never, as you were listing these things, you didn't say that. Some of them were sitting in an advanced physics class and realize there is no good it's just like, you know, oh, I emotional at the end of the day. These are real stories that, oh, I had leukemia as a child. Why would God do that? To an innocent child, or in your family is a real story. I knew a family that died on a private jet. But there were good people, if there's a God, why did the jet crush you knows all these kinds of things? I personally

have never met an atheist who was like, I was an Advanced Biology class when I realized there is no God, never. I haven't met that. So somehow, I do believe everyone has a different experience and story. I recently was talking to someone. And so I do a lot of like one on one conversations with atheists who want to talk and going back to that point, it's only people who want to have these one hour conversations weekly basis. Let's talk about what you believe why you believe it? How do you get to that conclusion? How reliable is it? Are you open to considering other things, and for many of them, they they claimed, and their families ended up giving this, let's say profile, that for

them, it started in university. For some of them, it was in science classes. And they came to this conclusion, unfortunately, due to the mass marketing and the appeal and the hype of New Atheists, that science says something that it doesn't actually say, and anyone who really knows what science is, and what science isn't, does not lead themselves to that conclusion. But unfortunately, that's what some of them were convinced of. However, it's possible that at the same time, these these doubts, were gradually building up in science classes, maybe that person was struggling with something else internally, one parent explicitly told me that their child I won't even identify

anything about them, was already known and feeling arrogant, as as early as high school. That was, they're struggling, a lot of people have said this about their, their sons and daughters, when they would reach out, they were struggling with arrogance, they would look down on others, they wanted to debate and argue they even got into like, arguing with and apologetics arguing with maybe Christians and atheists and others. And eventually they became atheists. And what's interesting is that they didn't realize that that arrogance manifested externally in one way, as they were being fed, maybe doubts by professors or others that they looked up to, or any New Atheists that has just been

exposed for their fraud over the years.

So when you say, this is a really interesting point, and it's going to be hard to summarize, of course, but when you say like, science doesn't lead to that, well, we've all been hearing that science leads to this and this theory and that theory, how, how can we say that science doesn't lead to or what are the gaps in these presentations? The first thing that I'll say is one of one of my, I guess one of the things that I've benefited from in the study of philosophy of religion, specifically, and I don't encourage this for everyone. And again, it's a longer conversation. But for me, personally, I felt that there were some things that I had an understanding of already from

the Islamic perspective. And that's why once I had that foundation, especially in Jordan with some of my studies, going to a secular university and studying it was not, I guess, as risky or problematic. And in fact, that happened. It also it is very bluntly, I don't like to say this, but every time it's been brought up, people say like you should let people know, what we have the intellectual Islamic tradition

is

unparalleled, even at the Western level at all Ivy League universities. And I know that's a very bold claim, and I have to backup that claim. And I can do that in a few minutes. That's beyond the scope of what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that what I had studied before vaquita and our faith, and what we have of history, just completely wipes the floor with

All the other claims about Islam. So it did not know to not like affect my ima negatively. In fact, it reinforced my faith, because I realized that a lot of the students and professors when they presented these arguments for atheism, like the the problem of evil or philosophy of science, they it's as though they were not exposed properly to the Islamic perspective. It's like most of their understanding of theism or belief in God was from Christian arguments, or it was like strawman arguments as arguments that they made up to present that this is what Christians and Muslims say. But in reality, that's not what we say. In reality, we have like much stronger evidences, then maybe

unfortunately, some Muslim students don't realize. And so with science, and again, going back to the main point, with science and with terms in general, it's really important to define and clarify what you're talking about. Like if there's one thing you remember from tonight's discussion, it's clarify what do you mean by that? Like, I can just right now say the word feminism, and they will cause like a stir without saying anything else? What do you mean, what did he say? Why did they say that? What happened at that program? What do you mean by feminism? I can say liberalism, and it might offend someone, I can say conservative progressive science. What do you mean by that? And so this is why

some philosophers and this actually goes back to even Taymiyah, rahamallah, and many others before him. They talked about language, the power of language, the philosophy of language, that a lot of confusion that exists in philosophy, and why most people around the world think philosophy is complex. And philosophers couldn't understand each other and never came to the same conclusions. That's why all philosophers basically disagree with each other. It's because of language. What do you what? What is it that you are trying to convey? What is science? Maybe we'll ask just about like, what is science? What do we mean when you say like science, and the study of science? Okay. I

mean, I don't know if I'm the guy to answer that. But

I was about to when you were talking, I was I remember that was looking through YouTube clips. It was like a clip from doctors. I can I can some guys stood in the audience, which shows like we, a lot of people don't even understand what science is, and therefore give it way too much weight. He asked him a ridiculous question that had nothing to do with scientists. So if I ask you, when did your mother and father get married? And can you prove that scientifically? It was like that ridiculous. The guy asked him this question. Then he said, Can you prove it scientifically? So what does that mean? How do you asked me a question like that? And it shows that the questioner doesn't

know what science is, but he thinks it's just this super weapon that he brings out and this word is supposed to decimate the opposition because he just threw that word in there.

The one of the things we learned from our chef Jaffa, Havilah, Jaffa, Jaffa, Idris, he used to always explain the difference between science and the philosophy of science and most people study a science but I need you to just give people like a two minute or one minute bio shell Jaffa because people don't know. Yeah. And I think even if people are able to go on to his website or Google him after they'll benefit from it's true, because I could look at so the website would be Java address.com. And it's Java with two A's. And he was one of our teachers in Virginia. And he was a, he's a chef originally from Sudan law. And be

just kidding.

And there were a number of things about him. First of all, he was a philosopher on the manager of Allison Nojima. And he is outstanding in that regard. Like he told me when he was doing his PhD, so he had a British professor, and he was supposed to, you know, write a book and everything on philosophy. He said, I wrote a 60 page introduction to the book. And when the professor read it, he gave me the PhD right then and there. And then he says, I naively refused it like no, let me finish the whole book. And then I said, I suffered for years writing that book, and I regret not taking but that's to which level and there's some other things I can really go on and on about him about how

much he contemplates the Quran. And he comes up with these, like mula hubba tat you say that, that know, these reflections that just right in front of everybody, but you miss it, like one should call them blind spots, like it's right there, but you just don't see it anyways. And one of the unique things about him is that he writes in English and he writes in Arabic, yes, he does, both better than but anyway, he's like, he you can go onto his website and you can find wonderful articles, articles about the attributes of God and philosophical issues and things of that nature.

So you're saying, I'm sorry, I interrupt you and no, it's just he was he would always explain the difference between the philosophy of science in science itself,

where people try to make it look like a scientist what can fit inside a test tube and you people always talk about that, like, as if belief in God can can be put inside a test tube, but it's all science does all science fit in a test tube? So he said that the philosophically science is atheistic and materialist

To atheistic meaning, the scientists does not give God as an explanation. And when you read a book on embryology for example, how do two cells keep multiplying until some of them noted become cardiac muscle, the other skeletal muscle and this knows to become hair and this cell becomes bone cells? And how do they know where to go? And how does that all happen? So the science book never says, Oh, God makes them that way. So it's atheistic, in the sense that it's silent about God. But that doesn't mean that belief in God is itself unscientific. That's That's one. The other thing is materialistic, meaning the answer has to be material or, you know, measurable or visually visible.

Like you told them. You know, there's something called Gender here, you can't see him, you can't touch him. And you know, okay, well, I don't accept that, then it has to be like, I have to be able to do something with it. Anyways, you I'm sure you can expound on that a lot more. Chef. Absolutely. SubhanAllah. I recently spoke to someone who said his reason for leaving Islam was science. I said, What is science? So you haven't taken like science classes. He's like science said, what science tell me what science is. Like? Well, I've taken physics, MIT student, right. So he's, he's boasting about, like, credentials. I got into MIT, and I'm in science and biomechanics, and everything else.

I said, but what is science? Have you studied the philosophy of science? Do you know the limits of science? Do you know what philosophers say about it as a tool? They said, No, we haven't taken philosophy of science. But I know science. I said, Okay, you're not understanding the question. Science is a tool that can help us to explore and discover some things, or try to explain things in the best manner possible, yes, and sometimes with limitations. But science is not a tool for everything. And if you think science can answer the question of God, then you don't know what science is. Why? Because science can point to certain things that spotlight existence of God. But

science in terms of a test tube, or in terms of an inductive argument does not prove God in that way. In fact, here's one of the greatest recent appeals to testimony, a professor 50 years as an atheist, notorious atheist, Professor, Anthony flue. And he's known for his his actual contributions, I'm not talking about surface level atheism here. He contributed to philosophical theology to atheism and a number of topics. And he became a believer in God at the end of his life. Now, unfortunately, he did not become a Muslim. And I don't know if anyone presented the right message of Islam to him. But that's a side point. The point is, when he became a believer in God,

and the atheist community went crazy and started insulting him and saying, You're just an old man, you don't know what you're talking about. This is the guy they were like looking up to for 50 years, he contributed more to his field, even if we disagree with it, than all of the New Atheists combined. And I'm not exaggerating. That's how much he contributed to the field. When they asked him why he became a believer in God. And if you read his book, it's not for everyone. But it's interesting to see his refutations of atheism, it's called there is a God are the world's most notorious atheists became a believer, he talks about science leading him to God. And he says the

problem with New Atheists is that they refuse to consider evidences beyond what they believe to be science, meaning what he said, I pose a question to my former fellow atheists. Would you ever consider any evidence whatsoever? Many have you stopped at the point where you say, I refuse to believe, because he says, if you look at evidence, and you cause your beliefs, meaning rejection of God, to shape the evidence, you won't ever believe, in fact, this is why some Atheists say even if they could see God empirically with science, if you will, they won't believe. And that's, that shows you that the problem is not a lack of evidences, it's not that there is there is not a spotlight or

signs of God or miracles of God, whatever a person is looking for, that's not lacking. And if you've ever had a conversation with an atheist, like a really genuine conversation, and you ever felt frustrated, you're like, I have all these evidences, they're convincing to me and 2 billion others, and also Christians, in some ways, why are they not convincing to an atheist. And if you think you're lacking a sign or an evidence, that's not the case, it's that that person is using a different tool altogether, or there misapplying the use of a tool. Science has limitations. And it actually as many scientists have stated, who believe in God, it goes hand in hand with religion,

it's one of many tools to know things. And sometimes you can know very limited things with science, some things that are testable, and other times you can't test things, things of the past especially. And so for Anthony flew, he became a believer in God, because of the origins of the universe, which science can't explain without basically what's called philosophical baggage without adding that commentary. So it can't be secular and say, the universe came from nothing or it was always there. The second is the existence of human beings. The fact that we are basically he calls it teleological beings that we are self reproducing, wanting to continue to self organize. It's like where does that

come from? Right. Forget Darwin, because Darwin also believed in God friggin

Darwin for a second, he's talking about the very first human being the very first living being that can't come from nothing or from a seller from atoms that don't have. So even that statement that you just made, Darwin believes in God. Most people probably have never heard most people don't know that. And the reality is, most people don't know that. What Darwin believed about science. And yes, he's obviously we don't agree with Darwin. But what he said about evolution in some of his writings was that perhaps these were the laws that God created that facilitated evolution. Now, we disagree with this, right. And there's only one major aspect of evolution, that I believe one specific aspect

of evolution that we can talk about and say is very problematic contradicts what we know to be definitive, or a clear revelation, which is the first human being, that's the main thing that we talk about. And there's no problem with that either. But what Darwin believed was that God created the physical laws of nature of the universe. And those laws continue to operate as God wills. So most atheists don't know that Darwin also believed in God. So that was the third that Anthony fluids that his name, Anthony flew, so he believes. So for him belief, basically, in the origin of the universe as having to come from an intelligent designer and the issue of the first, I guess, the

first mover the first cause. And the second is in the human being, basically a teleological beings. And the third, he talks about the existence of physical laws. And if anybody has studied physics, or symmetry in physics, or any basic laws and physics, you come to realize that really, the universe is fine tuned, it was made this way for our existence. And anybody who attributes that to chance, is literally living their life inconsistently with everything else, because nothing else has that kind of chance. So he said, The reason he was an atheist before is that he claimed that science had not advanced enough, meaning these things were not discovered, which is a really weak excuse, but at

least he became a believer, at least he did eventually say, you know, what science does point to God. So if atheists today won't take this from somebody like Antony Flew, they likely will not take this from somebody else who comes to them with any other kind of evidence, although again, every case is different, and I personally do not give up on people are generally talking, they're not arguing they're generally willing to discover, to explore to see the flaws in their reasoning, along with Todd on exactly what I wanted to ask. Both of you actually, you've listed in your course 18. I think proofs for the existence of God. And people will have different reasons. Everyone one might be

inspired by a different proof like he came with three proofs another person might be an emotional experience, another person might be something like consciousness and other person might be the Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu, wasallam. Chef, Kamal, as far as your go to proof, do you have a go to proof that you'd like to start with? Yeah, so I have I have two routes with the atheists, especially in the old days. And by the way, just so we're clear, it doesn't matter if it's a Muslim or non Muslim. No, it doesn't, doesn't? Or yeah, go ahead, I met someone from a Muslim heritage versus something.

So the first thing is I'm not well versed in the whole, this philosopher said that. And philosophically, I never got into that. And I always had a very simple, simplistic kind of approach in this issue. The first thing is

Yanni. In the old days, I would tell people, okay, explain the Quran, like, where did it come from? Give me a plausible explanation. As long as it makes sense. I'll take all right, you have to explain to me how this book came about. I'm saying it's God's book. All right, and which is a perfect being so so it should be very easy to disprove me that if it's not a perfect book, it has flaws. It has contradictions, it should be really, really easy would look like I'm in the weaker position here. All right, give me a good explanation of how this book came about, or to the other route as we go through analyzing who was Mohamed Salah Salem. And we start with the premise that there are two

options. Either he was a genuine Prophet, or he's an impostor. Even if he was well meaning Well, wishing that still means he was not genuine, Allah did not send him. So then we analyze all the data about him, his teachings, his life and everything, to see if he fits the description of an imposter, or Julian profit. So this technique, the first time ever tried actually was with on an atheist. And it was a Muslim guy who came in like, hey, I want to marry this girl and she's atheist. Can you prove Alexis, if she's wanting to listen, that's the easiest thing in the world. We sat down, we went through this exercise, she became Muslim. They got married, they just had their third child.

That was the first time I used it. The last time I used it was with a Muslim, who like Shia Hamada was saying, was saying, I don't believe in God, I don't believe in Islam. It's not the truth. That's okay. Who was this man? selasa All right. And you have to give me an explanation of how he wrote a book like the Quran, how he knew all this stuff, how he knew history and how you know it, never, you know, all the other stuff. I don't want to go into it. I've gone to it many times before here and I want you to go into it. That's great. Actually.

So if we can

do the prophets of Allah, this and maybe everybody could participate in this, if the province of the lightest Saddam was a false prophet, what would be the signs of him being a false prophet? And then we'll just have them

respond? What would be a sign of a false prophet? Forget the problem homicides on him? If there was a guy claimed to be a prophet, how would you know that they're fake? If you walk in the room right now and said, I'm a prophet, I'm a prophet of God, what would you be looking through questions? What would you ask him to see if he's telling the truth or lie? It's easy right for them.

Sorry.

That was that was a physical mark on a Nabi Muhammad Sallallahu sallam. So it's not like every prophet had that. But

his his message? So what's the most what? Like, what's the number one message for example? And if he says something outside of what every single prophet has ever said, that's already strike one, right? And that's, that's why the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith, his first message was Strike one. And the second one was Strike two, like he didn't fit the mold of a prophet at all. What else could you

like a genuine Prophet with a genuine? A false prophet, for example, might use the money to fly private and build mansions and live a luxurious life. A genuine Prophet would practice what he would preach. So the imposter? Not necessarily, right. Camilla kalila, who will be sleeping most of the night Good luck and then so on and so forth. Musa La Mancha. What's the first thing he was like? No failure, and no Asia? Yeah.

The hypocrites favorite, right? Okay. So basically, we would go through a list of what a genuine profit looks like. And then we'd write down a list. And we do this on paper as we write, because also one of the advantages of doing that on paper. I use paper a lot, because one, most people are visual, and they understand better visually. That's why we have chalkboards and blackboards and all that and to when they back when you trap them later on, and they try to backtrack, you take that point and say, Hey, we agreed upon this rule, and they're like, oh, okay, so they're trapped. Alright. Anyways, I don't want to take too long on this. But the point is that you have to explain

how a man salatu salam 1400 years ago, could write a book like the Quran. And science is just a little part a small part of the Quran I hate how we make it like the Quran is a book of science. Okay, but still, how did he know all these things? How did he know all this history? How did he never inject his his own emotions and whatever turbulence went in his life, he didn't inject that into the book. You don't see the Quran being more cheerful around the birth of his daughters, you don't see it sad, meaning the writing becoming sad, how does he keep his he keep it stoic and keep his emotions out of it? How does he? How does he know all these laws? You know that video that we

made the recent video it's called how, what is it called? It's like why the Prophet Muhammad wa salam couldn't have written the Quran. So we then we list all the different skills you would have to have 1400 years ago in the desert, from some divorce law and right and civil rights law and criminal law and tax law, all these things. At one time I did this with a co worker, we just listed all the skills the problem had to have had 1400 years ago in the desert. And then like 36 of them from everything from raising children to this. We just made a long list and I asked him, How did he know all this stuff? So the guy forgot our coder.

And then he says, I believe he put his head up and he says, I believe that Mohamed Salah Salem, was the reincarnation of all the greatest minds in human history into one person. That's how he knew all this stuff. I said, Okay, I'm gonna ask you a question. Be honest with me. And this was a co worker, it could be frank with, I said, What is more probable that he was a reincarnation of all the greatest minds in human history? Or that he was a genuine prophet of God? And will lie, the guy put his head down, he said, he probably was a genuine prophet of God. So I always told him, give me a plausible explanation. All right, if it makes sense, call us not normally when I leave you alone,

I'll join you come on, but just told me how a man could have written a book like this. And it's also a total package, you know, these religions with

holes in the story, right? And that's like, the biggest sign of something that is not the truth. There is a hole here that contradicts the other hole over there, and it's just a disaster. But how did he come he creates such a complete package. So that's really I never go the philosophical route like okay, there is no God. Explain how the Quran came about. And when it sorry, again, when you were talking earlier, you know, those magic tricks where the guy puts the prediction in the envelope, and then after you pick the card, he's like, open that envelope. And he's like, so awesome, because like I knew it before. I love doing that.

With the atheist, before we even start the conversation, I'm Tom, I'm going to tell you a sentence now. And I'm going to repeat the sentence a number of times throughout our conversation. That's the case in Christianity. But that's not the concept in Islam. Because just like the chef said, a lot of times they just have they understand Christianity, and they think that's the concept of God everywhere else. And so Jeffery's told us a story said he was at the University and had this British professor. And it's bad enough that he's British, but he was like,

We got to slam the British Come on. He was like, all religions, this, all religions are manmade, all religions have that. He said, I put my hand up, I said, How many religions do you know in detail? He said, Just Christianity said that. Why are you saying all religious? Why don't you just say Christianity then? But everybody makes this mistake. They know one religion, and they start to apply that to Islam automatically. All right, but I gotta ask you a question. Okay.

And this is like, what do you personally believe here?

I'm trying to say it without saying what I believe okay. But do you believe there is such a thing as someone that is completely 100% to the core? Atheist, meaning they do not believe in the existence of a creator whatsoever?

I'll answer that question. After I add one more point to your last thought is the two things that Shift Command said are so crucial if you didn't hear pay very close attention. So you ask the question, Chef, I'm all about what are the ways that you talk to people about God the existence of God? Like for example, in actually want to hear your answer also. So the link is Yeah, so like in the link the seminar like signs, and again, for those who are interested, really like join us for the class. I think it's the last time I'll be teaching this. live online, inshallah. Tada. So this class, we go through 16 arguments, they're not all inclusive. But why do we go through these, let's

say 16. And what do we end with? You will find we start with a filter, the natural disposition we all have. And then we go through different types of arguments to show you what's out there, like the teleological meaning the argument from design. So that's where all the scientific stuff really most of it falls under there. Then we get to cosmological beauty, consciousness, all this stuff, what do we end with, we end with what I believe to be one of the most effective things and it comes with the complete package about a philosophy, which is the argument through Joseph Quran. The Quran if you study its urges, meaning its miraculous nature, and the Prophet SAW Islam, if you study della Enugu

are worth about in the world, the proofs of profit, you cannot come to any reasonable conclusion, except that Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam was a legitimate genuine messenger of God. And the Quran clearly is the speech of God. And I'm saying this not based on just my belief as a Muslim, or what I was taught in Sunday school, I did my first thesis in the University of Jordan on Energizer Quran. And I know this sounds very weird, but I went into it with what I feel was a really open mind to critique the arguments that scholars have presented about Energizer Quran. And this was after a friend had left Islam. And he brought up he brought up the Quran, and said, Okay, what's

your problem? Like? I see the same argument. And I'm saying, clearly, it's the speech of God, where's the missing link for you? What's missing? And he didn't have a response. And long story short, he left atheism, by the way, Al Hamdulillah. But my point is, I actually delved into a Jazel plan to see do we have like intellectually satisfying arguments? And yes, there are maybe some arguments that are asked about or presented maybe in English today that were not addressed, yes, 1000 years ago. But ultimately, ultimately, all it takes is to study one proof, or two or three after maybe stunning a dozen claims of adjusted Quran. And you can see very clearly, clearly with no

doubt whatsoever, the Quran is the speech of God. So it comes with a proof of God and a proof of Islam in one. And that's why I generally, please remember this, I generally urge you all and parents, young or old, wherever you're from, please study these two topics, if you have not before. Also, remind yourself about these two topics because it renews your faith, the proofs of prophethood and urges of Quran and you can find for example, on your clean Institute's website, these two S series right so you read the proofs of profit seven or eight articles, by ship punish knowing May Allah reward him you have as well urges around the series started, I'm actually working on that. And

to go back to the magic trick, the shell command mentioned, I wasn't expecting that. The recent paper I submitted it was the third only in the series was on prophecies of the future. Because if you want to claim this human did that human role, you can easily eliminate all of that by just showing that this person clearly had divine knowledge of the future that cannot be from a B or C human being it cannot be from anyone. It clearly is from God. And obviously, this requires you to read like into the article and so on and so forth. So that's with regards to the 16 art by though I add another one just for fun. I told him he would also have to be a time traveler, so I can go back

in time and also

put his name and description in the Bible, right? Because how did what are the odds that there was someone named Mohammed mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, described as coming from Arabia riding a camel, you know, from Arabia meaning peran, which is, you know, in Arabia and from Becca, which is Mike. And then it so happens that 600 years later or

I will alter if no testament than 600 years later, someone happens to have the same descriptions and also got the ideas let me pretend to be a prophet and create a new religion. What are the odds of that happening? So these two arguments are to me they're what should have come I mentioned they're bullet proof the province that Elias LM in the Quran. So what I've been able to share with atheists is listen, any Muslim, these are our two shields right here. So if you want to and Allah Subhana Allah, we have this principle of falsification, we have a way for you to show that it's not is not true. If you want to prove that it's not as not true. Allah subhanaw taala says, then bring up a

book that's equal to the Quran bring a surah that's equal to the Quran. And the fact that that challenge has stayed for 1400 years and there's a beautiful Hadith of the Prophet sallallaahu Selim that I didn't understand when I was a kid. And I remember thinking to myself, like as a kid, like probably miss Eliza Adams miracles, like they're not like Sudan man, it surrounds miracles, or at least it said I was miracles or Musa splitting the sea like Rasool, Allah, Celeste, and it was a miracle. And yet he says, No prophet was given a message, except that they were given a miracle through which the people believed in him. And he says, and what I was given his way, what I was

given his revelation, and look at the statement he's about to make, he says, and so I hope to have the largest number of followers on the Day of Judgment. That's like, what's the connection, he says, what I was given, my miracle is revelation. And so I hope to have the largest number of followers on the day of judgment. And it shows actually that the prophesy synonyms miracle is the greatest because his miracle it being revelation is a miracle that actually can be witnessed by every generation of his own as opposed to everyone else. Every other miracle was limited to the to be witnessed by those who actually happen to be present, you have to be with Benny aid when Musa was

splitting the sea. Otherwise, it's something that you hear from the generation before but every single Muslim from no Mohammed Salah lightest send them can open up the most half and can actually experience the miracle of Rasulullah last little ideas and about a coffee from Chef, I actually want to go back to the really important question as well. The chef asked, which is, do we believe that or you're asking do I believe that any atheist is truly 100% atheist. And in fact, one of the new atheist without mentioning names, presented this scale of like zero to seven, or one to seven and said, Seven is like absolute atheism. 100%. And he said, I'm a 6.9. Why is like you can't claim that

you want 100% can prove like prove the lack of the existence of God, you can claim you believe that. So atheism by the way, the word and atheists, there are many like classifications there's, you know, strong, weak, positive, negative, and so on and so forth. Some atheists believe that they are 100% convinced, but they cannot claim nobody can claim that they can disprove the existence of God, and especially for atheists, because most of them are empiricism materials, they're only using one tiny tool in some part of that tool, which is usually science, which cannot disprove God. And this is really important to keep an eye on but on this note, to connect the to what you just said,

I spoke to somebody who left atheism, and I'm summarizing, like a really long conversation, but it started with prove to me that God exists. And this is usually what people start with when they don't know anything about the word proof. Like what do you mean by proof on what is a proof? What constitutes proof? How reliable is your method of understanding? This is a proof that's a different topic. But I asked him, What do you mean, prove the existence of God? Like what would convince you that God exists? This is what he said, and this is what most atheists will respond with. And this exposes where the entire rest of the conversation has gone. Instead, all believe in God, right now,

if God presents Himself to me, and like, does something and formula kills this person who's sick? I said, that's your term is like, that's my term. If that happens right now, I'll believe in God. I said, Okay. Why? He said, because it's a miracle. So okay, so you believe it's logically possible that God can show us miracles as signs of his existence? He said, Yeah. I said, let me ask you a question. I see what you're saying. But is it logically possible that God gave us miracles that are not on your terms? They're not on your toes, because you're not God? I said, is that logically conceivable? Or am I being irrational is like, no, that's technically logically possible. I said,

How many signs is like, what do you mean? How many signs is it possible for there to exist that point to the reality of God that are not on your terms? It's like, I mean, it's limitless. Countless can be anything. Right? Doesn't have to be the God presented Himself to you and that's a very arrogant claim, but that's

sight point, we're having a conversation trying to lead a person, step by step to realize what they're what they're really saying. So he said, I believe that, you know, there are limitless possibilities. I said, Okay, let me ask you a question. Is it logically possible that that miracle one of those signs of God, on his terms is that he gave us a message, his speech? Is that logically conceivable? Just said, yes, it's possible. So okay, let me ask you a question. And this goes back to exactly what Shift Command mentioned, tell me what are some signs of a speech of God? Like if there was a speech from God? What would prove it's not manmade? It's like, Let me think about it.

And he listed some things, the message would have to be for example, like perfect, can't have errors, right? God doesn't have doesn't make mistakes cannot be comparable to any human speech. I said, Excellent. What else? He said, It has to have some information that the people who access this, let's say speech cannot possibly come up with, they can't know it said, Excellent. What else? And he started listing things. And it has to have like, complete objective morality, meaning has to give us basically timeless morality, what's right and wrong, that's coming from a factual source, a pure source, said, Excellent. And as he lists these things, I think maybe maybe 1011 12 different

things. Finally, I said, You know what, let me introduce you to what the Quran actually is because you just define some aspects of the origins of Quran. He said, There's no way I'm like, What do you even know what the Quran is like? The Quran is violence and like you guys take over and Sharia, I'm like, Man, you have no idea what Islam is about, is like, well, I know Christianity. And that's the same thing, right? It's not the same thing. As we went through urges of Quran and this took maybe three, four or five months of weekly meetings. Eventually, he became a Muslim. But the conversation started with him realizing and asking the question of, basically, what are the terms that you have?

There are some people who will answer this question with an arrogant response. And they are not sincerely looking to believe in God. But if someone is, at least led to that same conversation and conclusion, even if he rejected the conclusion, he like, rejected Joseph Quran, at least he knows that his initial claim that God has to come to me on my terms, has basically failed. And this is what most atheists don't realize, until they have these conversations a lot of times, Jimmy, you know,

when you said that proof thing, and God would come and do something miraculous in front of me.

It's in the shahada workshop in the old days on the section on atheism, which was very small, not 500 pages, like five pages.

So I have some

optical illusions printed on the page. And, and the reason they're there is to say, Okay, look at that, you know, there's illusions where you see a straight line, but other lines are running across and it looks bent. But when you put your finger or ruler or something, you see that it's straight. So I'll tell them, does it look bent or not? And everyone says, Yes, it does. So with your eyes, you see it bent, and then I'd say, okay, but is it straight? Or is it bent? Everyone says it straight. Because even though they see it, so what is stronger here, what we call, like mental seeing, or what you know, here is even stronger than what you see. When you get when you see an illusionist make

something disappear? Or he levitates you always ask, how did he do that? Because you know, he did not really do that. Because even though you saw with your own eyes, you still didn't believe it, because this is stronger. So I always told the Muslims as far as like a Dalit technique, that mental seeing is stronger. So I will show you God but I won't show you God. I will show you a miracle but I'm not going to show it well. Maybe the Quran you can show them a miracle. But, but that's very important. And I was told we don't have a long pole that we can open and show him. That's a Jana. That's your seat now. I can't I don't I can't. Anyways, so Felicia,

I wanted to ask about the the need for greater education for the Muslim community. And as far as advice that you have for them, you've mentioned that the European series on edge as a Quran but

you mentioned also books to read, like what what subjects should people be interested in studying? What do we need to do as a community to be able to protect ourselves and protect our community?

I think she'll come out also, like has already a lot of contributions to this. And I did attend for those who don't even know what shahada was. I attended the shahada seminar when he taught us a double weekend way back when she back when she had come out was like really funny if you guys use that where the law is, it is logical conclusion came from that line. Because when you said that my ears perked, because you still always say is it logically possible? Is it logically possible?

Or philosophy often like is that something that's conceivable? Like something that's possible? It's just so someone realizes Yes, it is possible? Therefore it leads you to what city was this by the way? Detroit your work? Okay. And you should back when I was funny what makes you think I'm not funny now.

Kamal, by the way, like, when I think of like,

cool

comedy. I don't say hello, comedy in general, from like the Islamic perspective, it's always useful to command. And sometimes I say then somebody's like you mentioned, Mr. Leno shift command. I'm not funny at all. So, but we look like that's all. That is.

The question of education, I think the most important thing is a lot of times is recognizing the need for it. And what is the issue? What is the problem? Before trying to look for resources and content strategy and a curriculum? What is the problem, one of the problems is that a lot of parents are disconnected from what children are, what their, their sons and daughters are actually learning, or the problem of someone going to a, let's say, public school for 18 years, public university and no Islamic education or maybe a second third grade level of Islamic education, where these two are not really adding up and a person gets to a point where everything else has essentially shaped their

beliefs about the world and especially public university, except for Islam, studying you know, critical thinking of epistemology, some of these current trends in you know, our leader, attending signs, if you will, Inshallah, tada, this is the last time we'll be teaching this as an online class, inshallah Tada through and motive Institute. These types of topics and 100, they are increasing in number, it shouldn't be included for starting from the parents the responsibility on the on the shoulder of the parents, Islamic schools, the massage, and obviously, the Imams weren't aware of these topics and presenting them in their own communities, but not shying away from

conversations. The question of why is the question everyone asks today. Whereas for some, you know, youth, they come to us and say, My parents said, don't ask that question. You can ask, why are you questioning things? This is a taboo topic. And in this country, and in most of the world today, there are no longer really questions you can't ask, meaning you should be able to ask and have a response for even if the response is leading to a resource or something else, there are conversations that should be had. And I do believe it goes back to the parents. And if anything, this benefits the parents, when they recognize what's happening. What are the liberal trends out

there, the secular trends, the byproducts of atheism, what does it do to people and you know, how this shapes this, the secret discussions we have within our homes, but how important is a spiritual base, as opposed to just intellectual conversations all the time, I know, you have something called the fifth of the protection program, and a lot of it is spiritual acts acts of worship. So if you could comment on that, because it's not just always just, you know, reading articles and, you know, watching YouTube videos, so I don't see it as dry intellectual conversations. I know a lot of people see like, some topics, maybe philosophically or whatever it may be as like, very dry, it's not

spiritual, and maybe in some things like the technical terms, but when it comes to, you know, these two topics, for example, Joseph Quran, these two are very important. When it comes to the discussion we're having, it actually increases your image, you're studying how everything reminds you of Allah, every single thing around you, every every drop of blood in your body, your neurons that are firing off, every moment that you're walking, every breath you take, all of these are signs of Allah subhanaw taala it within ourselves and all around us all across the universe. So studying this topic actually increases your iman in many ways, depending on how you study it. It's not devoid of

spirituality, a lot of time.

So

the reason I really don't believe there's anyone that's completely an atheist, and I know, you know, you what you explained was very academic, you know, 6.9 he agreed. Yeah, I mean, out of seven. Yeah. So a number of reasons. Number one, the fitrah is something that is so deep, it's too deep for you to go back in and format, you know, so I only covered Hmm, it can only be covered. Yes, you can only Yeah, I mean, and I know this is like a long discussion. I'm not going to go into it in depth. I'm just summarizing my my brief points here. The fitrah. Is this this innate or what's the word we use? disposition? Yeah, this natural disposition and you're and you were created believing in Allah

subhanaw taala. And then the parents will you know, what's the word?

Yeah, they'll they'll reform it. They're moldy. Alternate. adulterated right. Anyways, that's one the fitrah to a verse in surah. Nan, Allah Allah says fella Murgia at home is tuna mobile certain called Lua several movie was yeah, how do we how was the pinata and fusuma Voldemort, although it's really powerful. And you would imagine that for our own he's saying there is no other God besides me. He is destroying a whole peoples. He is boiling families and oil alive to say there is no other God, I'm your God. And yet Allah subhanaw taala says when i Our Signs came to them mobile signal they could see the signs. They said this is obvious magic and

They denied it. But internally and only Allah can say this, they were certain from it was safe. But apart from your clean, there were certain. So then then there's the other things. And there's a little bit of cognitive dissonance. I don't want to go in detail, but when you talk to them and the way they behave in the vlogs, and the aggression, that's all part of cognitive dissonance, but

I was just listening on the way here I was listening to.

And I'm going to ask you about this documentary is really superb. But Dawkins, and he was being asked, okay, how did life come on Earth, and you won't believe what he said. He says, at some point, there was a more intelligent life out there. All right, that came, and he he's launched a war against what they call intelligent design. And then he use the word intelligent, and designed to explain how life came about, he says, a more intelligent life form. He didn't say, alien, or what have you, at some point came and planted the seed of life on Earth. And then he says that life itself must have had an an ultimately expression of an ultimately explicit explicitly explainable

Lionni

explanation ultimately.

And anyways, so he's saying that in the end, there was something that planted the seed that designed, all right, and it was intelligent. That's one. Then there was this other clip where these two guys I don't know, they're both fat and ugly, but some something Harris and the other Hitchens whatever, they're sitting down, and they're talking about the the computer program thing. Yeah. And you ever heard this? It's so ridiculous. They talk about what if life isn't real? What if we're not here? What if this is a very, very advanced only simulation computer simulation, a program that has us feeling things and experiencing things and everything and everything? So at the end of the day,

we're talking about it, and then they're getting more excited than the looking dumber by the minute. And then, yeah, for real? And then what? So basically, this computer is sitting somewhere, some nerds desk or whatever, and we're all part of a program, what have you.

At the end of the day, are you just so arrogant, that you will believe in something that ridiculous, and it's all in an effort just to refuse to say, God?

I'm one of these. I'm in a computer simulation and someone wrote this program. Just so I don't say God at the end of the day Biller, which is more makes more sense. That brings me to my question. Have you watched the documentary expelled? No intelligence allowed? I saw clips of it and reviews of it. Okay. And it wasn't on YouTube for the longest time that I've checked again, today, they put the whole thing on YouTube for free. You know, Ben Stein, remember that clear, clear eyes commercial. That guy Ben Stein, when Ben Stein's money, that guy for his Jewish obviously from his name. So he put together this documentary, it's called expelled no intelligence allowed meaning intelligent

design. It is an absolutely absolutely superb documentary. And I benefited from two things very much. Okay. Number one, for the majority of the documentary, he's exposing what kind of just alluded to earlier that, so you think it's just clear cut science, right. But he's exposing how first of all, it's they work like gangs. And by the way, in academia, they have a lot of these things where, for example, someone will write a book, and then other people will keep referencing that book to kind of elevate the importance of that booklet, oh, every other book I read is referencing that book. So they work like kinda like, you know, a mob or something. So he was then interviewing

college professors who were not even Christian, who were fired for daring to say that creationism makes sense that it's more plausible. One of them said, it makes more sense than the, the origin of life presented by you know, you know, create, create on what are the what's the other group evolution and what have you, he got fired for that. Then they interviewed him, he's like, I'm not even Christian. Then. So he exposes how within in academia, they silence each other, they fire and threaten people and he interviews them. That's one. Number two, then he moves on to exposing in the world of journalism, if you even slightly side and give some credibility to creationism, you are you

are threatened, you are discredited, you are destroyed. And then he interviewed a number of them like that, and not all of them. Some of them weren't even Christian. Some of them one of them was a Jewish woman and stuff. She said I was basically killed out of that field of journalism. Why because she said something positive. So then what is presented to the public is that this is scientific. This is the truth and there is no dispute about that. And then Sorry for going too long, and then the other then you then explain

is why these cases end up in court? So he's saying, if it's science, what is it go to court. And then when it gets to court, they make it look like

evolution wins all the time. And then in recites, you know, in Tennessee, there was a case where, you know, the Supreme Court there, you know, allowed them to teach creationism, and so on and so forth. But they always make it look like they're winning. In the lab, they're winning in universities are winning in court. That was the first thing I benefited from, like, I realized how this machine works. And you need to watch that. It's called expelled. No intelligence arrived, then the second part that really, really greatly benefited me from this documentary is that, and I was upset with myself that I never asked myself this question before. So they're saying, you know, just

consciousness came out of unconsciousness, life, life came out of no life. So if I, you know, take a chair, I sterilize it, there's no living organism or particle on it. And I put it in a closet, and I close the door, and I leave the chair there for 100 million years. And then we come and open it.

Where would life come from? We're going to find like little deer and rabbits and skunk guns and waterfalls, where would life come from? Even if it's a billion years, there was no life, where would it come from?

And then he talks to them. And first of all, Dawkins is clearly saying, we don't know, nobody knows, nobody has a clue. Then they talk about some of their theories. And I was so shocked to hear about the crystal theory, which is, like how they try to explain how life came about. And it's so dumb, and they're saying, you know, the right amount of proteins, and this gut and carbon mush together. And then there was a jolt of electricity that ran through it, possibly a lightning flash that hid just like Frankenstein's monster, the electricity and stuff, they tried to 1953 to replicate these experiments with utter failure. And then how did they complete and you need, like 250 proteins to

create just a simple living organism. And then you need something to create life. And it just piled some proteins together will breathe and move and read later on. Anyways, so then they said the crystal, they came on the back of the crystal, and you know how crystals multiply and expand. And as they the crystal, because the cell is on the back of the crystal as a crystal expanded, the SOS expanded and,

and all this noise and ruckus you guys are making. And this is the garbage you have for me, at the end of the day. You're telling me it's science, and this, you have the crystal theory. So, ship on that point, I know we have to wrap up Russia. Number one, know that there are a lot of politics involved. And this started, as we stated earlier, at the beginning, this isn't a new thing. But it started to increase in the 1900s on number of court cases, just in the United States alone about this, the topic of evolution and creationism and other things. It was partially due to the poor representation from the creationist Christian movement that caused the unfortunate push back to

teach this as a part of science, it was just a really poor effort and representation. And that's why we say a lot of people when they think of arguments, and atheists bring up these arguments, they're thinking about some versions of Christianity, or some ideas of God that don't reflect what we believe as Muslims, we have an intellectual tradition. That's solid. And in fact, once it is, you know, at least in my conversations, once it is discussed with people who are genuinely open to learning about Islam, or number of people, professors, students and others, they're shocked that they had not been exposed to this before, and many of them are convinced by Al Hamdulillah. The

second thing aside from the politics is exactly what Shift Command said, you have the hype, the mass marketing, the click of new Atheism and other movements, something like a book called A universe from nothing by Lawrence Krauss, he was he was challenged by a number of physicists who said what do you mean a universe from nothing? What's nothing and he made the same mistake that many atheists made before the 1900s in which he's defining nothing as a kind of something like a space in a basically a place with some kind of maybe quantum fluctuations, whatever it may be. And then when a reporter reached out to him and said, you know, this was the title of your book, and you didn't

answer the question. He said, Why didn't make any claims. This entire book and you made millions of dollars and convinced so many people, atheists, Muslims, Christians and others, that there's some scientific evidence about a universe from nothing I'm holding upon me Lady che and I'm humbled Holly, Allah subhanaw taala asked that they basically were they created by nothing, or did they create themselves and and so on and so forth. He said, I didn't make that claim physicist tore him apart and so on and so forth. But the point is, what you see in terms of presentation does not necessarily reflect what is true meaning eloquence or complex language or anything fancy does not

mean something is true. We measure things in accordance to the content the substance

See what it actually says. And if you go back to those two topics, just so that everyone remembers Insha Allah, those two topics that shift command mentioned, I believe, are crucial as a starting point for every Muslim family in the world, every Muslim individual, there are a dozen Quran and Allah Uniball start with those two and you'll find not just the intellectual boost, but inshallah Tada at the increase in Iman connection to Allah subhanaw taala through his speech and to the Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam.

Okay, what if someone says,

you know, you have a lot of things in Islam that you can't really prove,

even if they use the word scientifically, or if they don't use words or anything. So they say, for example, like how do you know, there is punishment in the grave? Or how do you know that a good deed is multiplied by 10? Or how do you know there is a paradise and the Hellfire like, what kind of telescope? What kind of device? How can you show me that? Or prove that to me?

And how do you know? How do you know? The you know, the rule goes all the way up? And it comes back to the all these details? How do you know all that stuff?

And you go, that's all as a consequence, after proving that the Quran is from Allah Subhana Allah and the Prophet sent him as a messenger. That's very true. And there's, so if I get a group of scientists in a room, they're very honest people, and we sit down and say, Okay, we're going to analyze this Quran, we're going to use critical thinking, we're going to use logic, we're going to be rational, and we're going to analyze this Quran for the next three days, nobody leaves us room, pizza, and Quran only. Okay. And we're going to analyze every aspect of it to conclude, to come to a conclusion at the end, whether this book is from God or written by a man, a con man, a group of, you

know, a cult, whatever. All right. What, when they're done, if we do this correctly, they should conclude that this book is from Allah as origin. Right? Is there anything unscientific, unscientific about the procedure?

No.

There's nothing unscientific about analyzing something and checking it for falsification tests, all that stuff is nothing unscientific about this process. So I'm using a scientific process that in the end, comes to this conclusion or leads me to this conclusion now. But so yes, once we conclude the Quran is from Allah azza wa jal, then I believe any word anything in it, but the reason someone asks you a question like that, is that and this is a nice point that makes your life easier right? There for the Westerners, there's only one source of knowledge. And that is the universe, everything you learn will be from within the universe, whether it's observing how animals behave, or how certain

gases move or, or planetory, planetary bodies moving, everything you learn, your source of knowledge will be from this universe, then you apply the methodology, experimentation, observation, you use the senses, these are the means of acquiring knowledge, the mind the senses, the you know, sets all that stuff. But for the Muslims, we have two sources of knowledge. And the first one is revelation, or, and some scholars break it into two meaning and while Mubasher will come about your direct and indirect minute Quran and Sunnah. All right, and then the second source will be the universe. All right, so that so in the first source, we know that because of Revelation, we know that a good deed

is multiplied by 10, then multiplied by seven multiplied by 100. But you cannot set up an experiment to prove to me that your dollar will be multiplied in reward. There is no microscope, no telescope, no camera, nothing you can do from the universe to explain things from the next world or the unseen. And that's and we have revelation. And so it is upon the believer who is a scientist, to reconcile the two is the famous example is give us you study psychology, and they don't have room in psychology for gin possession. And as a side any as a, as a

disclaimer, Gene possession is extremely rare. All right, it's 1% of the time, the other 99% It's just people being whatever, bipolar schizophrenia, whatever, it's everything else. All right, but it does exist. All right. But the Muslim who studies psychology under the West Western discipline, they don't have room or they don't allow for gin possession, even though it's rare, so we're clear. They don't allow for that. So what happens you get a Muslim who says, I don't believe in gin possession. It's just bipolar. It's just this it's just that whereas their job would have been to, to mesh the two together. You've got revelation, and you've got the other source, which is the universe but

you're studying your discipline, under the philosophy or under the viewpoint that there's only one source

I don't know if this was making it looks like when I look at people make it looks like I'm not making sense.

Does it make sense? Well, I'll stop here. So join us inshallah Tada for I'm going to plug in the science seminar that we're teaching online two hours on a weekly basis. One of the first things that we start with is how do you know what you know epistemology, like revelation, testimony, science, empiricism, rationalism, and as Muslims, where do we apply each of these? Where are they useful? Where are they limited? It's very important for us to know these things. And it helps us with critical thinking, challenging false assumptions, making sure arguments are strong, making sure there's evidence we are an evidence based reality and Islam is evidence based. Yes, there is the

fifth law, which is an evidence and there are many other things that we cover in this class, but it's important to start off with some of these foundations. So we can inshallah Tata have a strong foundation and a strong approach to Islam that's robust wherever you are logged on. By the way, I pulled some strings yesterday, they sent me the course notes, all the recorded videos. So that's my plan for next week. And we're looking forward to your feedback.

We know you're very busy this weekend, you're presenting at the American Muslim jurists Association Conference. What paper you're presenting the problem of evil the problem of suffering, so the entire weekend, people are

Imams and leaders and dots are converging. here in Houston we see Sheikh Mohammed svaki is blessing us with his presence tonight Masha Allah Allahu Akbar, the living legend, Imam of Memphis Islamic center and so

it's all going to be on the topic of atheism the entire conference so yesterday man I was also teaching a series called Philosophy and coffee on faith essentials the online that's starting this week to this week, inshallah Tada and Allah Subhana Allah bless you and he has a lot of articles on the FDA website 15 Institute's so you can reference those there Sharla I got to tell you guys a story about Mohammed funny right there that guy right that guy right covering his whole guy over there. So he used to come lead that away in this Masjid in Virginia, big Masjid like

and you will if he is she gonna lead Aisha? Probably he leads he will understand the story better. All right. So he was hooking up the the DUA in Witter. All right he was hooking it up and some guy got so excited and love the DA so much. He screams in the middle of winter die in Salah Turkey

and then a bunch of other guys go Allah

that's my favorite story about

Muhammad Okay, Mashallah. Jeff. So I'm on duckula here. So pleasure and may Allah continue to benefit through you and bring more benefit in sha Allah zoeken look at everyone's were coming in for attending amaro and we'll see you next week. Also next week top we don't tell them yet. Okay, well let you know what the next week's topic is. Salam Baraka Mohamed Salah Malik.