How did Ian Blissett accept Islam on his own

Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa salatu salam ala Rasulillah Salam Alaikum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh, your brother Yousef chambers here, and I'm in New Zealand and, you know, we Subhanallah we've been traveling around the country for the last 11 days and we're on

a special mission to create togetherness, and we've come across this incredible household that has some really amazing stories to tell. So I'm going to hand you over a little bit and he's going to explain himself, but this is Brother Mohammed Zaid, Mohammed Zaid, Ian Blissett. So he's obviously you might have guessed, he's like me got a sub

A revert to the deen of Islam, masha Allah. So first of all, salaam alaikum.

How are you, brother? Very good. Yes. I'm very happy that you guys came to visit? Well, you've got an amazing story. Behind us, of course, it's all your array of different books. And some of them are Islamic books. And some of them are history. got things like forgotten heroes over there. You've got forgotten heroes, you've got the Maori books, and so on, so forth. And over on the other corner.

You've got a whole load of medals and honors that you've received in, in American army, American army. There we are. So Mr. Mohammed Blissett. If I might tell you, you know, refer to you as what, when did you accept Islam?

Well, it wasn't a overnight thing. Yeah.

My problem is, as always been all my life.

I ask questions, and I read too much. When you read too much, you think too much. And I struggled for many, many years,

was the idea of the divinity of Jesus.

It bothered me. I used to sit in church with a family. And I used to think, Well, I must be the crazy one, because these people around me believe this.

And

I read a book from the library here. Yeah.

And it was, it was the life of the prophet Muhammad, really. And it was written by a Frenchman who was not a Muslim, but he was a professor at an Algerian University.

And he wrote this factual book about the Prophet's life. Now,

unless you were a quiz, Christian or knowing about Christianity, but when you were brought up was this divine Jesus, Son of God, etc, etc. And then I read this book about this man. And that's all he was a man. He wasn't even literate.

And yet, he lives this extraordinary life. He lived. He received the messages.

received the Koran? Yes.

This just blew my mind away. And you wouldn't understand that unless you so knew my background. So Ian, or Mohammed, Mohammed Zayed. Right. So

did you after reading this book from the local library? I started reading every book I could. I could. I fell in love with a man.

Yes, because it was so it was so extreme. Such an extraordinary story. I wonder what that book was? We need to get a copy of that. Well, it might still be in the library here. I don't know how many ongoing bucks 35 years 30 years ago or more than read a book. Yeah. So then then obviously, you must have met Muslims and then

you didn't know. Well, so you became Muslim on your own? No, no, I did. I did have some. It was the man from Christchurch. I mean, I had I had an adopted son, and he was born with a hair lip and a cleft palate. And he used to have to go to Burwood hospital down in Christchurch for

plastic surgery, etc. So while he was in hospital, I went to the synagogue

because inquiring about Judaism as well. And I also went to Al Noor mosque, yes. So

Oh, no mosque is my spiritual home. SubhanAllah. So we're on a journey to just have to take that off your moment Muhammad sorry about that. We're on a journey

to try and remember the people who died on the 15th of March last year in Al Noor mosque, and we've met you and you've basically gone to a Noor mosque, and that is your home where you kind of accepted and found Islam. This is amazing story. This is but confused. So you, you kept reading about this, and you were searching and you you went to the synagogue? Did you go to any other religious groups? Or? Oh, well, I was. I was Catholic at that stage. Right? I'd been other things as well, but always Christian.

But when you read about

religion in the Middle East, around the time of Jesus, you find out that there was

other virgin birth. There was

I think it was called a remaster. Sounds like a Japanese car. But he, he used to die in the autumn of every year, and then he would be born again in spring of a virgin mother. Yes, that was the same time as Jesus, right? And then you start thinking, oh, you know, which came first? And it costs.

You, St. Paul, he was the one that created Jesus from being a prophet into being divine. Yes, because St. Paul was a Roman citizen. And he knew if the

if this new Christianity was to spread in Rome, he had to make Jesus into a divine being. Because Romans used to worship that, you know, dead Emperor Caesars

is a big subject, and I can't cover it all. No. But

all I can say.

Very simply, I tell everybody, for 50 years, I lived in a room with no windows, no doors and no light. Hello. And then when I found Islam, I found the light switch.

You know, can I just tell you something? So, yesterday, I was telling the audience and I was telling,

actually, the team, the local team here with the voice of Islam team, that the description of me finding Islam was

I was stuck in a dark room. This is literally what I said, stuck in a dark room, gagged, blindfolded, with my hands tied behind my back. And when suddenly somebody kicked the door down and dragged me out and released me. So it's exactly the same way that you've described that. And, you know, and this spiritual journey doesn't mean any intervention of any human being. It's between you and your soul. And God well, yeah, I

I came to the conclusion, you know, in your heart when something's right

broke up my first marriage.

Sorry, that's mine.

Sorry, it's okay. It's only reminding us about Allah and

it affected my first marriage. And

but

I could have ignored it and kept going as I was, but I just knew in my heart

that was the right thing to do. Then if I didn't

follow his plan, I'd be living a lie because I knew what the truth was.

Muhammad What was it like

suddenly having to change having you had a lot of friends here? I'm sure you were very, very busy, busy man working and families and neighbors and suddenly you pitch up at the door saying I shudder and Leila Hillel and Mohamed Salah and you know there's a massive change and I I guess you must have been one of the very few if if the first Muslims around at all apart from a few

Oh was but the first Muslim I met here was Sunni mind who was

a slaughter man. The freezing works is similar

Alien. He was the first one I ever met. And before I had all the books, all of them if I had any problems or questions I used to go and talk to silly man.

So he became a very good friend.

But I'll just tell you why I chose the names Zeid, go for it.

I read this story, where this young boy named Zeid, I can't remember the rest of his name. He was a Christian boy.

And he was captured by a bunch of people, Arabs who were not Muslim. And they were on the way to see the Prophet. And I took this boy with them as a gift as a slave.

So after he'd been with the prophet for about six months,

the Prophet said to reside,

your father, and your uncle found out where you are, and they've come to take you home, you pack your bags in gone. So I've said no, I want to stay with you. Yes. So I was a Christian boy.

And I found Islam through the prophet.

So I wanted to stay Subhan, Allah Subhan Allah, Allah, Allah. So effectively, you found Islam through reading books from an actual fact, the first book you read wasn't even by a Muslim. It was a non Muslim, about the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and you hardly had any engagement with with Muslims at all. And then you just knew in your heart that this message was right. And you started to presumably practice and then pray the wrong way. I was facing

that way. You said it that way. Oh, give you 180 degrees. Yeah, absolutely. You read that in a book, presumably. And maybe I just was

my first wife found me doing this. And

that didn't go down well, at all because she was she'd wanted to be a nun in the younger days. So she was a very good Catholic. She still lives in town to

anyway, that's another story.

Later, on about two, two years later,

a Muslim while he was the supervisor for the freezing works, he used to come and see me. And he said, Would you ever get married again? He said, Oh, God, no.

I don't want to go through all that again. And then I said, Oh, well, if I met the right one,

I'd think about it.

I met Nisha through a friend. Yeah.

So it was a it was she knew she was taking a risk and always taking a risk. Yeah, but it turned out it was meant to be. It's just as an awesome story. And it's a very, it's emotional one. But it's also tells us a lot about the fifth era of the deen of Islam. If the fitrah is clean, nothing can come between you. And Allah subhanaw taala it's as simple as that your fitrah your natural disposition is always reminding you about God. And we Muslims just need to get together with our non Muslim brothers and sisters and neighbors, and just be Muslims in their face. Would you agree with that? Absolutely.

I've had nothing but respect from people.

Even at work, and

because I've been in New Zealand since 2020 72.

So people, you know, know me very well. And I've always had the greatest respect because people who know me know I wouldn't do anything without reading. Reading up completely. So they knew I wasn't

instant.

You know, I wasn't influenced by anybody. Yeah. And you got in your hands. I said, Have You Ever Have you ever heard of him? I have heard of him? Yes. This guy is extraordinary. He was Jewish. And it was born in Vienna. And he became a journalist and he traveled through

Afghanistan and he ended up converting to Islam. Somehow Allah earned his parents disowned him. He ended up in Saudi Arabia is it after the First World War? And he became king, the first king Saudi

Foreign

adviser, and he ended up in Pakistan. And he was the one that put into the Pakistani

Constitution that a woman could be president. He did that.

He died in he died at age 90 in 1990. And he's buried in the Muslim community

graveyard in Spain. But He's extraordinary. And it's the only translation for English speaking person

gets that bit of Arabic.

And then the translation, and then is that much explanation a nation? He was here? He was fluent in, in

the Arabic of the time of the Prophet Subhan Allah. So the meaning of words like Shakespearean was changed over the centuries that he understood the original meaning. That's very, very powerful. So So yeah, I mean, because we talked now on call about the literary miracle of the Quran, because the Quran is a miracle in itself, in the sense that the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi salam, he could not read or write. And he's he received this book, direct from the Creator, and the Arabic that he he bought from Allah was totally different from the Arabic that the Bedouin, Arabs were speaking at the time. And it's so it really confused them. And they thought that he was doing magic

on them. He actually thought that he was either mad, or that he was doing magic and they were very frightened of him actually. So

it is amazing. You should say that and we should all get a copy of this Muhammad Asad.

Translation of the Quran. And I asked Allah to bless, Uncle How many years have you been Muslim now? Oh, crumbs? How long? Have you been married?

Two years longer than I've been married? Okay. 32 years? Wow. I shall

never had any regrets. No, I don't think you would have had any regrets. I mean, so let's just end it until that we, you know, because we make this short because we all got to go off and go back to the cars and we've got to two more events tomorrow on the tour, the voice of Islam tour. And we Allah subhanaw taala bless you, uncle with many lives, etc. And may Allah subhanaw taala allow you to, you know, have genital docile Allah, the top part of paradise mean, Allah subhanaw taala allow your family to have that with you. And many of your friends we've seen Alan, we've seen Margaret we've seen people that are no doubt greatly influenced by you. And may Allah subhanaw taala bring

them also to the correct Deen of Islam. Amin was Salam alaykum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh.

One story, you don't have to record this, but just very quickly is going

on in 1994, my mother's 90th Birthday back in England. So my brother said, Nisha, and I went for my mother's birthday. And my brother said, my oldest brother said, Well, I know nothing about Islam. Can you bring me a book, too? So he explains it. And I'll read it. So I took him this book that I had

and gave it to him. Anyway, we came back here to New Zealand. In the meantime, my

brother's son

got a job. He's a he was a diver by trade and he got a job with the Malaysian government. Yeah.

Laying optic fiber cable around the coastal site. So my brother said, you're going to a Muslim country. They read this book that you wrote. And so you know where you're going. He read it. He ended up converting. He's still living in Kuching. Malaysia. He speaks about 10 languages. He is fluent in Arabic. He's married. He's got his sons names army Mia. And

so then you've already given a lot of doubts.

Can I ask one sweet, a short one? I'm gonna leave a message for the Muslims. One one like advice from your side, one beautiful message. And one beautiful message to the non Muslims.

Like for these lenders or Kiwis in general, like what do you like to be a part of this innovation project?

We're going down to south which is Christchurch, I just wanted to use it for future programs. If you travel anywhere in the world to motivate them from your story, one minute, one beautiful message like being a Muslim, and also

one message to the Muslims and one message to the non Muslims.

So well to the Muslims, I would say, know your religion, know your faith

but through the rubbish, a knows a real real religion

and don't be ashamed or afraid or hide hide your religion

because you think the people around you