Yasir Qadhi – Success Stories with Safi Bros

			Hi
		

			and welcome to another Safi bros. Podcast. We'd love to welcome an amazing brother from the US. You
have Dr. Yasir qadhi. Welcome to the Safi birth podcast. Zach malaco for having me
		

			thank you everyone hamdulillah mashallah, I think you've got one of the best Siri suit series in
relation to our see it off of the Rasul salaam salaam Shalom, shalom alphabetic freaking Shalom to
would like to welcome you in Sharla. Today is your success story as the Safi brothers do a whole
series on the success stories heading in sha Allah would love to take you back to you being born in
Texas. Yes, Houston, Texas. I was missing Texas. For that journey. Mom and dad how you ended up
there? That'd be great. I don't know much. So my father was one of the first immigrants from
Pakistan to America back in 1962. He came when there was hardly anybody else there. And he founded
		

			the first MSA the Muslim Student Association. He why Texas. So he got a scholarship to study at the
University of Houston it was just like, complete, you know, random things like that Allah Allahu
Akbar. And there was no other, you know, previous or he didn't know anybody before the start of
story you learn with 20 bucks in your pocket, don't know where, you know, he had to take a taxi to
the campus had no idea where to stay, you know, stays in a hostel the first few days, like literally
just the stories that we hear from that timeframe. So I'm the law. He came there. He did his
master's, and then a PhD, got married along the way, obviously brought my mother I was born, founded
		

			the first mosque for Sunday school, you know, so I'd have that. So I was born into a family that
already had a love for Islam. So dead came to study. It's like, yeah, Pa masters and PhD. Yeah. And,
and basically in medicine and pathology and biology. Also, he became a university professor. So was
he married then? Or do you know, when he came as he can was just single? How old?
		

			He was, I think 3030 31 a little bit older. But that was how it used to work back in those days. So
hold on, not to be married, but then to Yeah, so the heat because again, his well, you want to go
back even more we can go does this all vary person, but it's very, it's very relevant. Because my
father always says that, because he sacrifice for his parents. That's what ALLAH blessed him. Wow.
So his parents were, you know, they had given up everything to migrate to Buxton. So because you
know, the 1947, there was that scar tissue. And my grandfather wanted to live in a good Muslim land.
So my grandfather and grandmother decided to give up everything, and it was a huge loss, you know,
		

			because what happened in 1947, is that the Muslims were taken advantage of, because the locals would
not buy them because they know they're going to leave. They're not so you wouldn't get your money's
worth, you had to just abandon or sell for a pittance like nothing. Yes. So they gave everything up
there. We're living middle class life. And they ended up like pretty much in poverty when they come
because everybody's an immigrant, millions. Actually, historically, the largest mass migration in
human history occurred in 1947. The largest mass migration in history occurred when people migrated
from both sides. So you can imagine millions of migrants coming immediately to one city, what's
		

			gonna happen, so they were very, you know, impoverished. So my father was the oldest son out of only
two brothers and sisters. So he had to work part time, even as a teenager, and then a delay his
education. He actually gave up medical school because they couldn't afford the fees. He got into
medical school. He was his dream to be a doctor, he gave that up, right? And he kept on you know, he
would tell us this later on that because I gave up everything for my parents. That's why we ended up
with hamdulillah so blessed and fortunate, even though it wasn't the case. So long in the beginning
of Islamic dress, or my dad's the oldest, he sacrificed everything yet. He was a doctor to go and
		

			looked after his brothers and sisters. So Allah, Allah does not you know, take any of these things
in vain Allah azza wa jal rewards, when you get back to your family to me, Allah rewards this. So
		

			I'm saying we have something in common because my grandfather got really ill. And my father was the
oldest so you have to go back and he didn't get married to food.
		

			Because actually had to look after his family exam. Look after his brother, many years and he came
and left everything. Subhanallah
		

			Exactly. So it's similar story. Exactly. It's just your sacrifice for family and then it's amazing
how many of us have done that throughout the Muslim world that
		

			Allah is amazing that we are here suddenly sharing that Subhan Allah Allah, so take us take us as a
young chap yourself. So what hamdulillah so I mean, how many in the family for a month? I have one
brother, that seems more for our two boys, two boys, one older brother, just me and him. So see the
youngest one. I'm the younger one. Yeah, okay. You're the split one. Basically.
		

			The older brother always cops, the beatings.
		

			That's true. Yeah. And hamdulillah so, um, my earliest memories, you know, in
		

			In terms of Islamic stuff, there's really attending Hulkbuster that I just did not understand at
all, just disconnected for an alien, you know, mutually in Arabic. And obviously, we don't speak
Arabic growing up, you know, Sunday school was a chore and a war did not like going to Sunday
Islamic school at all, you know. So, I mean, that was one of the motivations for me that when I did
become a younger man, like, I wanted to know my religion. And back in the 90s, you're old enough to
remember this, there was no quality education in the English language. There was no deep level book,
there were no, you know, there were no like, odema who could speak English fluently? At my
		

			understanding as a teenager, you know, there were a man that had come to America, Egyptian
Pakistani, and if they spoke English, like, you know, half broken, whatever, and they had a
translator, translator, and then also like, the subjects and the topics, there's not a connection,
there's not a relevance.
		

			Exactly, we felt like they came from a different world to project
		

			without understanding and like we said, login, this doesn't really fit here. Exactly, manually. So I
felt this this this curiosity, this thirst, you know, especially going through college, I was
studying engineering, chemical engineering, you know, I love chemistry. And, you know, in our
culture, you have to be engineer, doctor.
		

			No lawyer, the lawyer, maybe
		

			the default, here be his,
		

			every one of our guests.
		

			Every one of our guests so far, is say that my father mother wants me to be a lawyer or a doctor or
an accountant, you have to do you have to I mean, it's just you don't even think what else can I do?
So because there's something and you know, I don't blame them. I don't them because they wanted
success for their children. They wanted them to have stable careers. Right. So again, I didn't like
biology, I just couldn't imagine being operating on a human body. I just hated biology. So then if
there's no, you know, there's no you know, a medicine. So there's got to be engineering out of
engineering. You know, actually, I flirted with aeronautical engineering, because I just like the
		

			idea of designing planes or whatnot. But then I said, you know, what, I like chemistry and chemical
engineering is a vibrant field, there's oil there, this and that, you know, so I did chemical
engineering, I graduated, I worked at Dow Chemical, which is one of the big chemical Corporation
plants in America in the world. So I worked at Dow Chemical for a while, as an intern, you know, so
meaning meaning before graduation, the intern Alhamdulillah, in our chemical engineering department,
there would always be like one student in the third year, who would get an internship, the top
student, I got that internship. What that did was that it guaranteed me a job at Dow Chemical when I
		

			graduated, Can Can I touch base on that? Obviously, to be to be recognized to be a top tier to be
given that. Were you always a person of excellence? Did you always try your best and you always
Yeah, that was always that was always ingrained in me by my parents, and also by myself, like I
just, I was the valedictorian of my high school, I was always wanted to study hard, just I had
ambitions as a child, but will lie, nothing to do with Islamic Studies, low ambitions as a child to
do something big, but not at all. It never crossed my mind. Never. When was that light bulb moment
that Subhanallah that you transitioned fully safe from so dunya to the irony that people don't
		

			believe when I say this, even when I gave up my my Dow Chemical offer, because so let me just
quickly backtrack. So I'll never forget one of my most iconic moments for me in my life that I had
applied to University of Medina in my fourth year, and I had, you know, been accepted. In July, the
acceptance came right for August, like literally one month, right? Wow, I have to make a decision in
one month. So I have like, on my desk, the Dow Chemical offer. And the University of Medina offer.
Whoa, dunya. And like I literally and I'm looking at, I'm thinking man, like, what am I going to do?
Because I understood this is going to be I didn't understand the depth of the decision. But I
		

			understood this as a big decision. So I understood this is going to really change course for me, but
here's the irony. I thought change course meant I'm going to have to study Dean for a while, and
then come back and do another degree or, you know, be put back in engineering or MBA or something.
So I thought it's going to be a temporary few years, where I'm going to eke out a difficult
existence, and it's not really going to be full time for me, in the sense. Remember, this is 1994,
something like that. There. There were no role models for me in the western world that this is what
you do when you're going to study overseas and come back. There were no you know, Rhoda Ma, that had
		

			come back and we're preaching. I mean, you know, that didn't exist. I mean, I remember 9495 We had
just heard of Yanni Sheikh Hamza Yusuf had just come back. And we were hearing of oh, this is like
the first Chinese American razor but even then, he was just beginning his his journey.
		

			There was no you know, career, there was no money or fame or career in Islamic studies. You have to
understand this point, you know, the remember that there was nothing so I thought it
		

			See? Exactly. So I thought I'm gonna have to sacrifice my career for five years, four years, and
then come back and then re habilitated myself in the engineering field or something, you know, I
don't have to delay my marriage, I'll have to give up my dunya everything I said, and inshallah I
want to know, my Deen. So I'll just go do that. So my point is, I didn't actually change career
paths. I delayed in my mind at the time, a career path, thinking that let me just learn the dean,
Danny, as Allah is my witness. I never ever dreamt of becoming a full time diary and preacher and
quote unquote, share never, it's not on my agenda, because there was nobody liked that as you're
		

			trying to say, right? So it was final that we spoke about that before a lot of us panela are
lacking, especially as in our age, we're lacking a lot of brothers to look up to or just focus on to
say, I can be like them. And humbler. This is the aim of this podcast? Because we really, we really,
are you for lacking that looking up to these non Muslims that that really don't have. They're not in
touch with our community. I'm not in touch with what it is to be a Muslim and also have that
success. Yeah. As a young chap, like esa 1213, you went to normal school. Now, is that true? Because
we felt that, you know, we live in East. So my father got a job as a professor and then the dean of
		

			the Medical College in King AbdulAziz University in Jeddah. So I went to a British expatriate
school, like elite private school, you know, like a private school British curriculum. Wow. And I
went through what is called the GC all levels at the time. So I did that. So in that timeframe, and
hamdulillah I'm living in a Muslim land, but there's no like extra. So I will tell you then, you
know, so I did my teenage years over there. Yeah. So you left you left the US at what age six
eclipses, six Saudi Arabia. Okay. And then coming back over here to America, you staying in Jeddah,
but the what you need to understand in the 80s living in Saudi Arabia as a Westerner, you are in a
		

			bubble. It's an expatriate bubble is you live in different places, you go to different schools, you
are disconnected from, you know, from the borders. And so it's all in Jeddah. Yes, Jeddah. Yeah, so
I didn't speak Arabic at all. Wow. No, not at all. I mean, like, how much is this? Yeah, but that's
it. Wow. Because there is no interaction. Or you're living in an expatriate bubble. You're wrong.
everybody around you is, you know, expat, you know, the buildings you're living in the school you go
to, right. So there's a huge disconnect. But I guess the positive side, I mean, because you're in a
Muslim land, you're hearing the Python and, you know, we go to MacArthur group regularly, because
		

			it's Jeddah, you know, I mean, there's no drugs or alcohol easily available, you know, that
timeframe, but I'm gonna tell you that so we had a beautiful I had a beautiful childhood. I read how
long we did what When did you get back to the US? Came back after high school. So this is 1990 ish.
Yeah. So most of your childhood years where you were in in gender? Yeah. Well, Mashallah. Yeah, so
that would have been? Well, so see when you brother, but yes, my brother came back way before he's
older than me. Okay. My brother, did he also follow the Islamic path? No, he's he has an MBA. He's a
business, business business consultant. Gela.
		

			Lis, thinking back, you grew up to six years old in America, went to the Mercy education there. What
was there a sort of a light bulb moment that got you close to Allah subhanaw taala? Or got through
the dean, as a young chap? Was it something that was a little burn in your heart that sort of see
that started? To tell you a nice, you know, romantic story. The fact of the matter is Kesteven.
		

			Fact of the matter is that Islamically speaking, I had a good childhood, my father, my parents were
very religious all the time praying five times a day. You know, I never remember a time in my life
where I wasn't praying five times a day. So my father instilled in me sada and eventually he
encouraged me to memorize the Quran in Jeddah. So I did memorize the Quran at home Subhanallah just
on my own, somebody would come in and help me you know, love your mom would come and help me but I
did it on my own in Jeddah. And then that was about it. There was no there was no, there was no
desire or incentive at that stage. Again, at this stage, you're not really thinking of Islamic
		

			studies. You just like, you know, okay, I'm a Muslim and hamdulillah when I went to university, I
had to make a decision. Do I really want to practice Islam or not? Because now University of Paris
can't control you. University, you are on your own lifeboat and it was at university that I
discovered I actually enjoy being a Muslim. It brings home to my heart and at university what was it
what was it that brings upon to your heart? So the the sense of nobility, the sense of purpose, the
sense of belonging, the sense of there's a higher purpose to this dunya at university I got involved
with the Muslim Students Association MSA Do you guys have
		

			gotten involved with the MSA? I'd be like my four years at university. Most of my memories are from
		

			The MSA not from the classes and exams. I was super active with the MSA my first year we doing so
literally the first week that I caught it I wanted to volunteer so they told me to Okay, call us
you're in charge of preparing the hottie microphone system and and do that, right? So they taught me
how to do that. So, you know, literally for the for like all this AV stuff. I'll be setting up the
microphone, putting all the wires in, you know, subhanAllah now people do it for me, but I started
saying it like so every time somebody does it for me. I said, may one day you also behind this side.
I've done this. I've done this as a teenager. And then the next year, they put me in charge of the
		

			data table. So I would be every week or every two weeks, I think we'd have a data stored on campus.
Okay. Again, this is like pre 911 by a decade, man, I need one I need to go you know, so every week
I'd be standing at the university main central like the whole the hub, and just have a big learn
about Islam discover Islam, and I'd be standing there talking with people, people, you know, asking
debating whatnot. So you kind of sort of started honing your skills about accuracy. So that was that
was your sort of foundation basically, that's like mashallah, like you're very well spoken, you must
have had a lot of practice. So we've we've, I'm telling you growing up, I was an introvert, go ask
		

			any of my, you know, friends back in, in middle school, I was a shy, geeky nerdy kid, I'm still
geeky, nerdy, but I was a shy, introverted kid, you know, I didn't have the the the, you know, the
confidence to speak in public. But University begins to change, you know, and when you're now you
know, on the on the limelight, Vikings, my first heard but also, that's also a funny story that I
was 17. At the Habib cancel at last minute, we found that there's no hotel coming. So the President
of the MSA says we don't have healthy you give them I'm like, I've never given a hamburger? Well, we
have to we don't have a club, you have to give her the whole book. So I literally like was put on
		

			the spot, like, you know, on the spot and Kibeho. Right, and then there, then we just had to just
prepare whatever I couldn't, you know, eat the whole out.
		

			But smarter than you realize, well, actually, it's pretty effective. People are appreciating what
not, because, again, you're speaking in their language, right? Yes. You know, the issues that are
that are that are addressing, addressing this has been I think one of the main reasons why people
like us have had such success is not because of Sephora lower stuff but a lot more pious or more
knowledgeable. No, it's because we're more relevant. We understand the issues, and I know what needs
to be said, because I also want to view I'm also living in the same society, you know, and so being
active, and then, you know, being involved in inviting issues and aroma. So we used to invite, you
		

			know, preachers to come and, you know, at the time, there weren't really like Ruta mob, per se, but
you had like Suraj wahat, you know, and Jamal Badawi, you know, these were activists, Allah bless
them, I owe a lot to them, you know, we knew that they weren't, like, you know, bonafide scholars,
but they inspired us with confidence and love, you know, and, you know, they just, you know, there's
something that needs to be done for the sake of the OMA. So those four years, it kind of sorta like,
gave me a taste that I need to be more active in my faith. And I mean, I've said the store multiple
times, I'll say it on your podcast as well. Um, one day in particular, remember, something that
		

			really is has remained with me forever. So for some weird reason, I don't know why I would sleep on
the floor as a teenager I wouldn't sleep on my bed or just sleep on the floor, I just have a light
mattress there just a light actually not even mattresses to think that so I had to sleep on the
floor, and my books would all be on the floor as well. Okay. And I went I was like, lying down and I
saw my books piled up organic chemistry and differential equations and whatnot physics. I've got
like all these books piled up you know, and they'll have the alarm and a student graduated whatever
Qumulo whatever did the thing is a girl good stuff, Hamza that was great, a student everything
		

			there. And I just kind of felt I've mastered all of these books, and I don't know the Quran. Allah.
Well, I've memorized the Quran. I don't know the Quran is this one book?
		

			And I don't know what it means. I don't understand Arabic.
		

			And I felt a sense of shame. I'll be honest, like all of this, I know. And I don't know the kalam of
Allah azza wa jal, you know, just felt like what am I doing? That's the emptiness Yeah, so as I just
felt what am I doing? Like how white how is this like, you know, And subhanAllah in the process, you
know, I heard of a university again, you have to realize 1992 93 nobody had heard of Mr. Medina.
Nobody's heard it this is a very different world. It just so happened I had met somebody who had
stayed there for a year and then was no longer there and we heard about it this is a university of
Medina us studies advanced in what not? So I said hola so I want to go there Medina Medina come on
		

			how can you not you know so i i Will for the Dow Chemical at work I got a certain amount of money
that same money I spent it all on a plane ticket to go apply to Medina Allah everything that will
back then come on, man, like I don't have any money. You know, like, I didn't want to tell my
parents I didn't tell you
		

			that's another story. I'll tell you as well in a bit because law look so you make a decision. Yeah.
		

			Are we on campus living on campus? No wait so when I applied to Medina apply application takes
months. So I did an awesome road trip. They knew I'm going for Umrah they didn't know I'm applying
to Medina. Oh, okay Sheila, you already had planned I had already planned that was the reason I was
going. Wow, we went to see you. I wanted to see I wanted to go there. Yeah. So I went and I went
into the office and you know,
		

			said putting my application directly to the director directly I wish to his office you know, and I
mean, I remember he was like very impressed that I'm engineering and half of everything coming from
the head obviously from America that hadn't happened before right. I was told by somebody I'm not
sure I was told that I'm the first born Muslim from America to graduate from Medina most people
before we were conference Wow, the first like born Muslim in America, who then decided to study in
Medina. Wow. So the director was lower than the dean of acceptance had actually studied in America
in the 70s He spoke some English so he was very impressed you so basically, I didn't know at the
		

			time but God except right then in there I didn't know at the time.
		

			So anyway, I wish it had told me back then I could have planned better but no.
		

			So yeah, so then I decided I want to go and you know, study in Medina, but I didn't know if I got in
or not. And then the Dow Chemical offer came, I'm like, Okay, I guess I'll take this and hamdulillah
is here. And then before I answered that one, I got the acceptance from Medina. So now I have the
choice to make 100. And the rest, as they say is history. But when I did make the choice, like I
said, my knee at the time was, I guess I'll go study a few years and then I have to come back and
start from scratch. Allah kept on opening doors and he's still opening