Full Lecture Transcript (Cleaned)
Interview session (Part 1) — 0:01
islamic society of greater kansas city in 2019 i was visiting one of my brothers in indiana and i am found i found this brother and his children are watching videos for shaykh it was about the seerah of the prophet muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam one month later i also was visiting another brother in chicago and i found also this brother and he was masha'allah imam there and his children and his family are watching the same series the seerah of the prophet muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam then i asked this imam who is the sheikh and why all these people are watching his series thousands of views about the same thing and he told me this is the best sheikh who is making this topic the seerah of our habib muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam he is making it in the best way then after that alhamdulillah i started following the videos of shaykh and i enjoyed a lot and subhanallah months ago i came here to ebike mosque to meet with shaykh assad it was great meeting and i realized why all these people are loving sheikh yaselkadi he invited me to his masjid and also i invited him to my masjid in kansas city two months ago i started watching a lot of videos criticizing the views or some views of shaykh ascertain then i contacted the shaykh assad and i told him there is a lot of criticism i wanted from you to clarify it because i want to understand and know the reality of all these criticism can i come to you and can you please clarify this for everyone he said of course this is why i'm here in ebike mosque let us meet sheikh hassan khali and interview him we are here in ebik mosque or ebik message with sheikh our sheikh habib we're going inshaallah to meet him we're going inshaallah to ask him uh we would like insha allah to let him be let allah clarify all these criticism we are so happy to meet you i just uh said the story how i knew you how i recognized masha'allah your videos and watch it and just check we will start a little bit with the criticism which uh there are videos talking about something from your views but before you jump into criticism because this is something any uh obviously it's a bit uh awkward for me and also i'm agreeing to be interviewed by you in this regard but i think the viewers also should know who are you and what is your background and where have you studied and so that we understand that you also are coming from inshallah place of knowledge and what not so i'm sorry to flip it around quickly but tani you're you call for an interview i said yeah whatever you want i also want to before you do my interview quickly do your interview okay inshaallah just hamdullah i graduated from al-azhar sharif and i have mastered agree with the quran and also i studied in saudi arabia for 15 years they're in saudi arabia my dad also was there as a taliban all this so your father is a sheikh and and my father now is the president of the scholars in europe uh in denmark in copenhagen the community there mashallah but your father i know that he was one of the main figures of founding i couldn't forget this because he also sheikha encouraged me to continue and he told my dad one day this salt this voice will be uh it's gonna be resounding in the whole world he said this to me after that i went to egypt i learned i have actually truth your master's is in the masters is also in the sciences of the quran and now you're doing a phd as well as right inshallah you're going to submit and inshallah soon you will be like i'm coming to you today so again because it's very awkward for me but to be very clear uh and i wanted the the people to know this this idea is from you and and you're the one who is asking multiple times so i said yeah bismillah i don't mind anyway i felt it it's okay for no problem uh audience okay no you know the reality because uh there is criticism agreed and uh people are wondering and i was also wondering when i watched some video i was wondering what's going on ask him let him clarify defend your brother in islam and this what about if you find yourself generally you did something wrong do you have any any stigma to clear or to yeah and clarify it and to declare that you were wrong and you found something true just i wanted to start with this one insha'allah a sign of humbleness and that every time a truth is becomes apparent that you should then accept that truth this is inshallah sign of humility and actually if you look at my my uh life of da'wah actually it is known that i have a major transition i was one of the main icons of a particular movement a particular interpretation i was teaching and preaching and i have moved on from that and publicly clarified and it has brought me a lot of negative attention which i understand a lot of criticism which i understand from the people that you know are of that movement so i hope that inshallah it shows that i have changed my position and it has come at a great personal cost to me um some of the people say that i changed for popularity to which i say uh refuge from that secondly what are you talking about popularity it is the change that has caused the criticism it the reason why there are so many harsh attacks is because what i'm saying is nothing new a lot of people are saying it but someone like me has not said it i.e someone who has studied 10 years ajam islamiyah and has mashiach like i do which i still respect and i thank allah for my jamas lamia but because i have now you know moved on i keep on saying moved on i have not saying any uh become a critic i think moved on from that obviously the people that were a part of that they feel betrayed i understand and they feel a hurt that how could somebody who has these types of credentials have these views so to this i say i hope insha allah whenever the truth is clear to me that i will accept the truth wherever it is from it is a sign of insha allah sincerity and i hope as well that insha allah my track record is clear to this regard actually now you clarify one from the shabahat or one from the criticism that if he is true truthful person does he accept to change his opinion if he finds the hakika they think that if you know that you did something wrong you won't uh clarify it now you prove to us i hope it's yeah we hope that's that's what we ask allah azza always to one of the other the process from his what says before we start uh this criticism let me also uh know the opinion or the view of shahid about attack we wanted to know what's the mean of akida or someone says that you have zelen or person a or person b have problem in his what that means and what that means that this person has facade you're asking somebody whose speciality is okay so you're asking me to answer in two or three minutes something that i have spent 25 or 30 years studying my majesty my phd is my actual speciality that i feel confident in presenting new views is actually in the development of so people to know i will try insha allah so the term actually is not found in the quran in the first place about this reality uh the term means to be firm and that's why for example in the quran you make your your oaths firm in the way of allah the term to refer to the concept of islamic theology what we believe is actually something that began in the third or fourth century of the hijra yani for 300 years the term aqida was not common to to discuss what we are not talking about anyway the terms that were used were iman or they would use kitab sunnah or even other groups would use so there were other terms that were used in the around 300 hijri 350 hijri the term right has this as well and also of the athletes they have you know uh what they mean is that which is firm and non-changing that which is not amelie but imani is that which is in the heart and what you believe about allah about the arakan of iman and it is not supposed to change that's why it's called so akadah is to be firm so they say that therefore is that which is should not uh you know uh uh whatever you believe about allah azzawajal about the messengers about the this is okay so we are attacking people that they have faced so of course this is a deeper issue who who is going to decide who's akida is correct or not this is a bigger issue so you have many different interpretations of islam you have even within a sunnah you have many many strands as well you know you have the atharis the hanabila and even this is a spectrum this is a mistake to think that they're simply one la the akida of the hanabi and the atharis themselves which one are you talking about is it ibn tamiya that is one interpretation is it ibn akhreel is it imminent jose is it even there is an entire spectrum even within the hanabila then you have the ashadi strand and even this is a spectrum is not like for example then you have the maturity and even this is not like so a tiftazani you have a spectrum here so the people who uh speak about this when they say that he has facade facades i understand this point what they mean is that i am no longer following a particular aqueduct that they think is the correct one and i respect their opinion i simply point out that is an opinion that they have there are other interpretations on other ulama as well who are also believers in allah is messenger their interpretations are different than the interpretations of the first group so i want to be very clear that i don't intend to defend arudhu billah my honor as much as i want to educate the people that when somebody says so and so has a problem in akhida you should ask okay so according to which aqir are you making this problematic right so they will say for example i take as my reference fulan you say it so this means anybody who disagrees with ibn timmy becomes muppet we have to be very clear here anybody who just becomes so you have made the religion therefore around a person this is a problem and ibn taymiyyah himself would find this problematic ibn tamiya himself would say don't make me as the criterion no ibn tamiya is an alim islam i respect him is a scholar of islam i don't see any i disagree with something but i respect him as a human being as a sheikh as an alam he produced something but i am not obliged to follow neither ibrahim we follow what allah azzawajal revealed and the prophet sallallahu alaihi so the point being it is their opinion that there are problems in my akrita i respect their opinion they have that right to say that but let us go into detail what do you mean according to whom where have i gone against what allah has said or where the messenger salah has said this is the point i seek allah's refuge from ever opposing the book of allah or from ever rejecting anything that our prophet salam said now the sources which we will go based on the quran and the sunnah of prophet muhammad this is our sources these are the primary sources no doubt no doubt okay let me start with the first criticism chief okay please open your heart when it comes to lgbtq uh issue do you support lgbtq political rights this is just direct question because the criticisms that you are supporting these people we just wanted to clarify it from you and i will give you inshallah uh so i have given multiple lectures about this issue and honestly i speak i say respectfully i don't think anybody who has listened to my prepared lectures i have three or four prepared lectures on this can have any uh you know misunderstanding about what i'm saying we do not believe that acting upon uh same-sex inclinations is permissible we think it is a major sin it is haram we are very very sad and to be honest yani even morally disgusted at the level of promiscuity that we see in our societies and our culture we feel that it is not healthy for us our children even for broader society even if the people are not muslim we say to them that this is harmful to you and to your children and it is sad that legislation is being passed that has normalized this and other types of fahisha now what the misunderstanding is occurring i'm very clear morally we are against this and politically we don't want it now the questions that again have been you know read into because i don't think what i have said is misunderstood if you listen to it within the context and i repeat it again suppose a politician has certain good in them and certain evil and you think you think the good outweighs the evil by you allying with this politician do you automatically affirm the negative and evil this is a separate question of whether it is evil or not now you can say that i don't want to ally with this politician good for you but can you say that a muslim organization or group that supports a politician for the good becomes evil for their evil this is what you're calling guilt by association this is making political loyalties into theological issues and this is where i said as a person of knowledge who understands theology don't open the door to make takfir or to make tabir based upon politics you know there are tyrants in the muslim world right you know forgive and guide them i don't agree with this personally they have decided the lesser of two evils is to work under the tyrant and to at least preach and teach by the way almost every muslim government and illinois right make this decision now those are who make this decision are we going to say and they're not saying it is halal to kill and what they're just saying for the lesser of two evils we're just going to accept this are we going to say that they are supporting the tyrant by the way we're not talking about the one who gives the fatwa that is halal to kill we're not saying the one who gives the fatwa the lgbt is clearly that is haram and it is but the one who says i'm going to have political alliances for other causes not for lgbt not for so again is there any politician that is saying that we're going to shut down uh the pubs and alcohol no every politician is there any politician that is saying that we're going to ban zinna and make zinna something that is illegal no it is the default so when you ally with a politician for cause x and that cause x is good i.e foreign policy stopping the invasion of iraq boycotting apac or whatever else you're doing and you think cause x is good and positive and islam says it is good and positive but this politician also has cause y and cause y is evil whether it is lgbt whether it is any other evil that they might have and you weigh x and y right and in your opinion y is more than x that's your opinion my position is you cannot make this person a kafir or muppet because of this assessment well i my speech is very clear brothers and sisters political alliances can be mistaken don't read in theological affiliations we do not support the political rights of drinking alcohol but it is there what are you going to do about it we do not support the political rights of we don't think it's good but what are you going to do about it in the world that we live in if somebody says it's the lesser of two evils to ally with this politician for a reason for a cause that is not haram then it's their opinion as for me by the way and again to be clear i have never supported a political candidate i have never endorsed a candidate i have never told the muslims to vote for a candidate and anybody who says otherwise they have to uh you know find the evidence for this it is simply not the case all i'm saying don't conflate political alliances with theological opinions and that's very very clear and allah azzawajal knows what's the second criticism that the criticism is it is shirk to go to grave and pray there and have like uh prayers there and make have tawasul there then you were very uh clear when you said that it's not shirk it's haram leads to shirk for now the criticism is it's why you said it's not shirk it's haram leads to so again so this is an interesting switch from lgbt to no problem um this this criticism of uh my view we have to be again clear here it's not my view it is the view of the vast majority of the ummah what i am saying is the default view of the vast majority of the ummah which is that sometimes sajdah is an act of worship when you do it to allah or when you do it to what allah has commanded you to do allah has commanded us to do sajda to him in the direction of the kaaba it becomes an act of worship sometimes the same act can become haram and but not so for example if somebody if somebody were to bow down to a human being out of respect it is haram not allowed in our sharia to bow down to him being out of respect but it is not shirk and if somebody bows down to an idol it becomes shirk and they doing it to that idol the same goes for tawaf sometimes tawaf is ibadah sometimes offers haram and bida and leading to sri and sometimes tawaf issued to other then allah the same goes for calling out to other than allah this is the default position of the majority of the ummah so uh when a person says oh ya sakali is saying that it is no longer sikh gently i say actually this is the position of every single shaykh and adam outside of that one movement that says it is can you give us examples for this in our time in our times the the best article that i have read is by mufti uthmani who is one of the muftis of pakistan one of the great ulama of this of this ummah go read his article he has a very it's in english he's translating into english and you can just google it and whatnot and i think and what not he has a very nice beautiful academic article about this also uh many of the ulama in fact this is the default of the position of the deoband the default of network uh this is the default of many azadi as well they say the same thing uh what ourselves also can we have examples now if you ask now here is where we get again the time is limited if you ask me my position and the position of many of the ulama who have studied ibn tamiya is that ibn tamiya's position is also what i have just said the problem comes that most of our brothers and sisters of the salafi da'an movement they have picked and chosen certain uh snippets of ibn tamiya's fatah in which he makes no distinction and he says it is shirk and it is true he says this but there are other places very clearly in much more fatah the collections volume 2 i forgot the page 345 and also in his book and also his book in which he very very clearly says that calling out to uh other than allah is sometimes sometimes now how can it be either in another place he literally says it is it is either a means to or it is now this is my position exactly what you said this is exactly my position it is exactly that sometimes sometimes exactly sometimes it is so for example when you need it so yeah i have a much longer lecture uh you can listen to it four hours it's three hours it's called on the next where you can listen to it but the summary of it is when does asking someone something become the type of du adati shirki we all know we can ask someone something we all know i can ask you something no right according to many scholars of islam you can ask even the prophet saslam in the grave this is ibn kodama and mainstream i disagree with this by the way but you want to open this door let's be clear they said you can ask the process of them to ask allah azzawajal in the grave you go to him and they base us on the verse in the quran right i don't want to get into all of these arguments but if you want to open this door uh don't say ya says say the majority of the ummah says say and now he says and if you ask me also says that merely asking other than allah does not become dua until conditions are met what are those conditions you believe the entity you're asking is able to give you independently when you think a nebi or a wali or an angel is able to grant you forgiveness or risk or life or death you have made an illah other than allah this is a rob that you are worshiping it is the essence of this is you you don't agree about it but when you think that if i go to the process of grave i say rasulallah ask allah to forgive me right so now you're asking him to ask allah i think this is wrong after his uh and he's in the cabinet i think this is wrong it is not shirk you're not making him a goddess who said this based on the concept of it goes back to definitions it goes back to what is it no doubt but the one who does this will say i'm not making dua why are you calling this dua i'm not making exactly what they said they said rasulullah said yeah so it is ibadah but what is dua of course dua is when does asking become they said that just to ask this is nobody says this even they don't say this i can ask you to help me get groceries i can ask you to lend me your car even they don't say this no but religiously so so let me ask you this we believe it will be religiously okay okay who who controls the keys of jannah who allows people into gender allah allah does anybody share this privilege with allah no no okay did i think that the prophet saws of course he was sahabi so what is going on here the feeling itself the believing itself so rafael wants the prophet salam to ask allah this is halal in his lifetime it is halal in his lifetime everybody says that even the salafi say it is lifetime in his lifetime the salah if you say once he has moved on to allah becomes shirk others say it's haram and others say it is historically it is what it is so when my critics point this out we simply gently say it it's not yasi versus the ummah on the contrary it is one small strand of the followers versus the rest of the um so what i am preaching is mainstream islam and all you need to do is historically look at what other ulama said when will it become shirk when you believe this entity is independently powerful to give you what you want yes this is shirk but if you believe that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam is going to ask allah on your behalf and he can hear you in the quran i say this is wrong and it's opening up the door and you're a slippery slope and we should not do this but to say it to has repercussions and it has dangerous repercussions and if you listen to my lecture on i go into these repercussions when they when our scholars have a niche then i respect them when ibn abdullah and i respect him as a person when he went down this road he had to make techfeed of the rest of the entire ummah and that's what he did and he said the ottoman empire is worse than the quraysh of makkah and everybody who agrees to the khilafah of the ottoman empire becomes a kafir murtad and he began killing people and he considered the imams of the haram to be kufar murtadun and and and so it's a very dangerous position when you say the person is committing shirk and you make takfir of the bulk of the ummah you are opening up a can of worms and this is what caused me to rethink through definitions actually this was the criticism number three that you criticized the sheikh muhammad so now you are declaring why you sow them i am not the only one imam ashokani this is my the criticism of ashokani the criticism about asani i have said in my lecture on i said don't just say me quote a shokani they both liked certain things about imra but when they saw the reality and the takfir and the bloodshed the both of them but we are criticizing this specific point yes they do this big to him and no doubt and no doubt are and again i have said this multiple times you have the right to disagree but i firmly believe sheikh hussain is this is my research and i can prove it and i'm writing an article about this as well information for everyone he is the first one here in america translated the books or the majority of the books of shahid well no you know everybody knows exactly what's going on i know i know abdulhab's books inside out and with atmos i've said that with utmost respect to my critics look at my resume and see if he kitabito hate the first one to do it i know all of this stuff and i studied with ulama and i still respect my ulama i have never once criticized but i've simply moved on and i respect they're upon good but some things they have they need to be corrected okay let me clear this now is respecting sheikh muhammad abdullah may allah be pleased with him but uh yes criticizing one thing that ashawkani himself criticized shikha-samani himself criticized for just only this part israel which is the issue of mass take fear and then the issue of a waging war against fellow muslims i have no problems if somebody says that uh making dua to other um sorry call so here's the problem terminology everybody says making dua to other than allah everybody says this even the muhammad says this that making dua to other than allah the question is what constitutes dua when does a request become dua this is the point so the one who is asking the prophet sallam directly saying ask allah to forgive me. go to him say why are you making dua to other than allah he will say for allah this is not dua i don't consider this dua so his knee is not to worship other than allah what so how can you accuse somebody of committing shirk when even if he is wrong his niyyah is to worship allah and nobody knows daniya nobody and so when you open this door and you accuse shirik and kufar you get literally you get isis and you get these taffetis and you get these crazy movements so we have to be very careful of this regard okay sheikh the third question is uh uh uh why we have to listen to someone it changes his opinion number one they accused you that you want to change your opinion and now oh you changed your opinion why we have to listen to someone who changes his opening so to be clear i have never called anybody to listen to me i say listen to the sheikh whose opinions and ideas your heart finds comfort the average muslim is going to be muqallid blindly follow the average muslim should stick with his scholar or sheikh that he believes is the one that is upon the truth if somebody feels that there's a problem with me i have said publicly no problem allah will not punish you if you sincerely believe that yasir khalid is because your told you so no problem your jannah and not is not dependent on your should come upon me it is dependent upon your ibadat and your rituals and your teschia and your taqwa and how much you adhere to the sharia so if somebody believes that yasaka is misguided that's their position and if they are sincere allah will reward them for that opinion no problem but if somebody knows and has studied him they should come to me and ask me one on one so we differentiate between the ami and between the taliban or as for the no problem as for the taliban i have no problem explaining my views but please understand this isn't like a defense of the persona of yq it's understanding why i'm saying what i'm saying right so if somebody is criticizing why has he changed his opinions what can i say to this uh i think it is not a criticism i think it is not a criticism coming from a person of knowledge let me just say this a person of knowledge understands that opinions change over time there is no alim in the world except that he has evolved and changed over time examples is somebody going to say that he remains sufi for the rest of his life come on look at his earlier books versus his later books look at his opinions in the beginning and at the end okay what was he what did he become this is the sunnah that when you're young you're impressionable when you're 20 25 years old you are going to make taklid of your masha'allah and you think the whole world is wrong except your messiah because your mind is still young it's soft it's impressionable it's just going to absorb but as you grow older you will start thinking in your own and you're going to say okay this is good even said this famously that i know what ibn taymiyah said but i would rather follow the hak than the position of my scholar even make a little bit his much many times not a little bit there's actually i have in my uh house i have a dissertation phd about uh him that he uh disagreed with him and if i'm not mistaken there's like 150 or something like specific points that ibm used to follow ibn tamiya in this regard then when it passed away became his own he has disagreements on many issues himself he found a 17 mistakes so it's well known he does he he he criticized opinions of who criticized who please again yeah so again he had disagreed with a position yeah he did he said that he said yeah it but again it is allowed to criticize political positions and 50 positions and he didn't criticize chelsea you have to be careful he didn't criticize the persona he said he was mistaken yeah exactly exactly disagree the knowledge of sheikh abdullah is one hundred times that the the knowledge of shaykh let me say also okay the knowledge is more than one thousand percent that the knowledge so and and we are allowed to disagree with one opinion and respect the person to disagree with an opinion is not disrespecting the person so now exactly you are imitating islam not just this all of the scholars of islam you wouldn't be a scholar you wouldn't be giving be giving something to god i i should say carefully okay annie clearly i'm saying you wouldn't be a scholar for allah i don't consider myself to be an adam but even as a toyota and even as a student of knowledge you cannot go and preach and teach and do something useful for the ummah except that you have to present in a different manner when they rethink through issues this is every adam and sheikh what made him different what made him different and now we even they have to do something different to benefit the people of his time so allah has blessed me to be born and raised in a certain land and to have studied in a certain land so i have certain things that any allah blessed me with so i have to teach my people the ulum islam in a way that is conducive to them i have to think through issues of modernity in a way that is useful to them so again it is up to the people if a person feels that so and so is misguided and wrong and they sincerely believe this no problem follow the sheikh you think is rightly guided but don't get involved in refutations you are a person who is following a sheikh when you follow a sheikh you should not be debating others okay okay number five that you are there in islam you having to talk about akira so number one what's the difference between there yes so i never claimed to be adam or if you mean a famous a famous incident sufiyan authority was said he was somebody called him he turned around he goes right so if you mean by what the quran says to have of allah who amongst us can claim this and i'll be the first to say arubi no way we are all sinful within the being if by adam you mean a person who has mastered all of the ulum and can quote you all of the books and has is sheikhoun islam but if you mean somebody who has spent 20 30 years full time studying the deen and has a good knowledge of all of the classical sciences enough to understand the sciences and has mastered some of the sciences insha allah i hope to be amongst that group but you see is recognized by the people of in yani i am not a a doctor if 10 doctors were to come and show me their surgeries and whatnot i cannot tell the difference between they're all the same to me but if a doctor who has studied now sees these 10 he will say oh this guy amazing he'll appreciate because he has the mastery so i say to the that listen to my lectures and you decide that's all i can say would appreciate a fellow who has studied the field now go listen to my library chats about these last 10 15 laboratories go listen to any series i've given the seerah series go listen to my barazak series go listen to my uh heaven and health series asa series go listen to any series i have given and you'll be the judge and if you feel that there is nothing of benefit no problem it's not going to harm you on the day of judgment and if you feel there is some benefit alhamdulillah from allah subhanahu wa allah has blessed me as a wasida but all is from allah azzawajal it talks about that they are in the island so what is he going to give that way to what do i don't understand this question adai will be calling to allah azzawajal those who are criticizing you they consider you as a deity again it's difficult to say this because when you say this it appears as if you are boosting your credentials while putting other people down i don't know what to say yani i studied in jama islami i was number one of my tufa when i applied to the masters program and i was number one in the master's program and there were surudis and and kuwaitis and mauritanians and whatnot lesser degrees than me one of my and i don't like saying this you have to say it sometimes one of my one of my colleagues in that my colleagues and i don't want to mention names one of them may take feed of me in class in class in front of the sheikh do you know why because i said that the earth goes around the sun and this is and he said this is kufr to say that the earth goes around the sun is kufur because allah says in the quran that uh uh that um that um so he said i'm going against the quran and and fulham and he quoted they said it is go for now listen to this this colleague of mine was a different national he was certainly nationality i'm not sure this colleague in a few years became a full professor of akita and in the two years after that became the east krsna's the president of the department the head of the department of akida same track my grades are higher than his actually right but because my jinsei is muktalif and beca so he goes down this track now what are they going to say any so what gives what do you mean to say so this guy thinks that i'm a kafir this the earth goes around the sun and he became the raised cosmonaut for many years and he's my colleague and actually not just my colleague i am he was one maybe he changed his opinion i hope he has changed i don't know my point is that people they they have this romanticized view of too much are human beings yes that means if you know how if you have one area you aren't there you know you aren't you nothing but you have one ayah you should based on this hadith to make balar for this ayah you agree with me of course we're supposed to preach and teach to the people and allah has blessed me to study islam full time for almost 30 years now i don't understand what do they want me to do to not preach and teach because i have views that are different from their one strand of islam i mean i am saying to them you preach and i preach and may allah azzawajal put barakan all over ta'awa that's really very simple yani we want to affect the ummah i also believe shaykh that people's mentalities are different and different people are attracted to different basha's i don't have a problem with this let certain people find comfort in one group of ulama let other people that comfort in another and fiklin as long as all of them have the broad basis of iman and allah and belief in the sunnah of the prophet sallam and erkhan and islam and wanting to read the quran and wanting to worship allah i believe these differences of opinion don't need to bring about such hatred and animosity i believe the ummah has bigger problems than this spectrum of interpretation so even if i have moved from being one type of understanding of sunnism to a broader minded because i haven't flipped and become another strand on the contrary i view all of these interpretations from a different angle as if yani they're all good i don't carry a card of any one of these i don't consider myself a member of any one of these strands and philip and interpretations rather and i look at the good and i try to overlook the bad and don't make tensions between the ummah so this is my overall methodology and management mashaallah this is my criticism number six i have to shift look at the camera because it's a big one and i have to know what's going on with these people the criticism number uh six unfortunately they said or they accused sheikh yasser that you are sheikh yasser doubting the preservation of the quran and you said uh clearly that the narrative has holes narrative has holes yeah that's what i said number one did you say that i said the narrative has holes but about what about what exactly about the preservation of the quran my interview is very clear and also i said that you know sometimes in the interview you don't use the best words and i said that no doubt is the words weren't the best but i was not speaking about the preservation of the quran it's very clear it was about one of the most technical issues which is and the reality of your masters and phd is in the quran out of all of the subjects of ulum quran you know as well as i do that is the one that that was one of the most confusing issues of quran is and all of the messiah can you explain it please this is the problem so there are a hadith from the prophet that the quran has been revealed in multiple seven right and we also know that there are multiple recitations of the quran that are you know codified the ten the seven the fourteen they are codified so what is the aharoof and what is the relationship of the quran okay this is the means yes this is one of the most complicated and dense questions that ulama have written about asuyoti lists 40 opinions in alaton right ashokani uh um also lists them uh our the the teacher of our teachers uh right he was asked what is your opinion about the ahref and he said my opinion about the is that i don't have an opinion this is a shankliti he's so confused i don't have an opinion about this right so i said peter by the way and the level of the knowledge of sheikh mendel some would say even higher some would say even higher so my point is that um certain issues arose about my position about that other people who perhaps haven't studied as deeply they found very problematic and they accused me of becoming mufteder or baal or even kafir because they didn't you know so these issues had to be clarified so i said you know the the majority opinion of ahrif and qaraat i don't agree with it and the narrative has holes in it i agree i shouldn't have used those wordings it's a very painful wording the kuffar and even some of my critics they began saying oh he is saying the this i'm a half of the quran every day we read the quran for somebody to come and say i'm doubting it's painful yeshua i agree it wasn't the best wording but look at the interview wallahi it is crystal clear i'm talking about the reality of the reality of his relationship with the quran i have an opinion i have a position and i don't mind teaching it to anybody who has studied and we can but you cannot explain it in two minutes online and again i don't like saying these things but you know one of the critics of mine and again may allah bless and forgive them they haven't studied these issues they haven't and when they hear an opinion that they've never studied they think you are the kafir model so he said to me your position is kufr and i'm going to get a fatwa from the kibaru ulama i'm going to get a fatwa that you are kafir because of this opinion i said bismillah but just one any addition make sure they also make takfir a tahawi and abu fatla razi and shafiri and i mentioned five or six people he goes what what do you mean i said my opinion is exactly the opinion of and i mentioned the whole list it goes no way they said this and i quoted him look up right now book up second he didn't know what to say and they don't even know they don't even know other opinions and why this point you exactly were imitating a bunch of ulama my opinion is nothing new nothing new i agree it's a minority opinion no the word is what you used exactly no other words was wrong but i'm following in my opinion now no problem you disagree to a no problem but please understand i'm not bringing anything new it's not something that i have an opinion that is a minority opinion and i can back it up and i have no problems discussing with people about him in this regard so this was the the whole kulas anyway about the preservation of al-quran kareem he wasn't talking about the quran he wasn't talking about of sabah and this big issue between and sheikh just was imitating a bunch of starting from sheikh al-imam is that right exactly doubt number seven we will change a little bit we'll talk now about shia and there is criticism uh and this criticism is uh you try to make unity with jihad so this is kala mujmal it is a speech that is ambiguous what do you mean unity i have been very clear that we have different different beliefs i have been very clear that i am sunni and i respect the sahaba and anybody who disrespects the sahaba i cannot respect that person as an individual actually i will not pray behind such a person who curses the sahaba i will not pray behind them but does this mean that we go and start killing others bombing their shrines does this mean we start civil war between them so i have never called for unity actually iranian tv press tv interview me it's online and they asked me point blank do you think there should be one masjid i said no there should not be one masjid historically since the beginning of time there have been two masajid for the shia for the sunnah and let it be because the differences are too much you cannot expect somebody who curses that we're going to be silent as such a person let there be organic difference but there shouldn't be there shouldn't be bombing there shouldn't be violence we have to agree to disagree in this dunya and let allah subhanahu wa to add a decide or affairs in the achara and i've also said we will unite for the greater good i.e there is an islamophobic candidate running for office right we need votes to push this guy out i'll get the vote of the kafir to vote this guy out simple as that i'll get the vote of anybody to if somebody wants to ban our message if somebody wants to uh shut down our message we need to get people to help us in this regard yes we're going to come together for the greater good this is the unity which you meant so the unity for the greater good which is the quranic unity you can make with anybody we're going to feed the poor cannot bring the kuffar and help us feed the poor you shall we're going to build a hospital cannot make ta'amu with the kuffar to build the hospital you have to kill them that's not me that's not those who are criticizing we have this that's their methodology i think it's wrong and dangerous and evil talk you haven't to sit you haven't to laugh you should attack them and if that's their way to kill kill them this is very so i have said from the beginning there's a time a place a language a methodology to teach these sectarian differences i have never said we are the same actually interestingly enough last week i have a big facebook post there is a very evil movie that was released uh about london about london yeah i have a whole facebook post very evil well live very evil movie i said this movie is public its correction needs to be public but when we correct we don't make ta'ameem we don't generalize all the shi'a kuffar no anybody who believes some of the doctrines of that movie has committed quote from no doubt about it if you believe that yani uh them to death which is the movie shows this right put poison you're going to believe this is beyond the pale of acceptability you know so i said this in my facebook post so what unity are they talking about but should we now make techfeed of all of the shia should we say with the the we're going to bomb their shrines and kill them so there's a middle ground here and when i try to argue for that middle ground some of our brethren they they they think that this is ignoring the the the mistakes that they have and i said no the average muslim should not be taught to hate another muslim we can teach the correct view without teaching hatred of the other view i can teach my people to respect the sahaba without teaching them to go bomb the one who or to make techfeed of the one because again what again this is a technical issue when does kufa occur it's disrespecting a companion is fisk it is not kufuru to be very clear disrespecting the command now to disrespect the prophet system is not about that right one question if they are cursing the sahaba cursing the sahaba it is what requires a bit of a distinction the default is that it is fisk it's not kuffit in and of itself but it might be if you are for example in particular for example when allah says in the quran and you say he is not of the sahaba their interpretation it wasn't uh he wasn't their interpretation yeah and so we open up a so this opens up a very dangerous door and we will correct these mistakes we respect the sahaba you clearly now say that you don't agree about the unity which bring some people cursing the sahaba to be with you in uh one message or something you are not with this i think i heard this from you yes i have said this i won't allow anyone comes here to the member i'm not going to allah if i am in charge nobody who is cursing the sahabi should be preaching but if we unite for another cause it's so clear yeah it's very if we unite for another cause not for uh the person who has this deviancy should not be teaching islam to my own children to my community i understand they will preach to their community what are we going to do about it again people get they get frustrated trying to be practical what do you want to do about it what i mean what do you want do you want to want to go kill them some of them say yes what are you going to do from those who criticized you he believes that you should if you have a chance to kill these people you should make that that's his view i think it is islamic and i i follow here what i did politics was with the khawarij the first the first khawaris that broke away right he tried to convince them with his talk with him in abbas he made a back and forth with them when they refused it's well known you look up any book of tabard when they refuse what did he say we have no right to force them to do anything as long as they don't harm us and he let them be in their camp until they began killing then he attacked them he gave them the freedom he gave them the freedom to be i know this sounds harsh to some of the salafi brethren but it is the truth as the khalifa of the muslims he gave them freedom to be are you more righteous than ali by the way in a land of non-islam are you more righteous that somehow you want what do you want to do and we have our ideas as well okay it's pragmatic tolerance we have no option except to say you have your way of teaching we have our way of teaching and we will disagree and agree to disagree but there's no benefit yes we see sectarian violence in the muslim world we see people bombing other people and people killing other people that are muslims where does it come from it comes from the mouths of mashaykh of both sides who keep on teaching hatred hatred hatred hatred what's going to happen when you teach this hatred its explosion is going to become a bomb so i am not following that path when i don't follow it people think that some of my critics think that i'm ignoring the differences no not ignoring well i'm not ignoring that's a clear no shift okay criticism number eight which is so dangerous also that you described the sun from the quran and the sunnah text as a problematic text and you literally said bizarre again this is something that we need to be again multiple angles to look at first and foremost first and foremost if and this is i'm teaching this as a simple principle if there is a preacher a teacher a person who has many many lectures if you find a clip that seems to go against everything he's preaching yani you should have some hasn't what is going on what did he mean okay unfortunately what we find is that sometimes some of our brethren may allah guide them and forgive them they take an ambiguous clip such as this one and they use it to negate hundreds and thousands of other clips and explicit statements and this is wallahi it's as if allah is saying that yet allah says of the quran of the quran forget ya speech of the quran allah says there are people that will find ambiguous ayats and they're going to read in to cause fitna ignoring the clear ayat so there are always going to be people that do this i seek allah's refuge i speak to these critics and say yeah yeah please listen to hundreds of benders and lectures insha'allah you will find some love of the quran in sunnah what did you mention so so first thing i want to begin with this is when you find something like this yeah any understand first secondly the story of this is also again and i seek allah's refuge if i made a mistake let me explain what is intended and what is going on so uh during the crisis of isis isis the fitness going on and america was on high alert and there was legislation in 22 states attempting to ban the sharia i don't know if you know this is before you came to america no i don't know yeah 22 states attempted to ban the share islamophobia was all time high during this time frame and one city i forgot where in pennsylvania one city uh for the first time got the city council to come to its iftar uh to its um annual event and the mayor to come and they invited me to be the keynote speaker so the first time uh the non-muslim delegates were coming and the mayor is has come and you know they said this we have never managed to get them now and there's some talk of you know some issues against the muslim community we're coming we're asking you to come and clarify what is going on so the bulk of my audience were non-muslim you have to understand this point now sometimes when you're in front of a live audience again you have to think of words and sometimes not the best words come out so again i see kala's refuge if the the phrasing was wrong but what was the intent the intent is not problematic at all maybe the phrasing could be better no doubt but again when you put on the spot sometimes you say things that you wish you could prepare the speech you're not so somebody asked me about isis taking slaves something like this you know and doesn't the quran allow slaves and slavery okay what i wanted to say and maybe the wording wasn't best but the concept is 100 clear and i'm going to explain it and i've explained it in the past actually explained this multiple times is the following that every faith community has issues that it has to struggle with actually allah says in the quran allah says in the quran some things you find difficult okay this is factually correct that there are issues that you find problematic in fact our ulama wrote books about the problematic issues of the quran right right explaining the problematic hadith this is 11 11 volumes 11 volumes the explaining problematic hadith is imam al-tahawi saying the quran is problematic the process he is saying we have problems understanding it is problematic for us to deal with this we don't have a solution we're struggling to get to the solution right so this was my point in trying to explain that look we all have issues that we find difficult to explain they are problematic for us this is something every island i remember reading a commentary recently it goes he says this this hadith is problematic and i don't know how to resolve actually about the height height of adam right he goes this hadith is problematic and i don't know how to reconcile between archaeology the what he says by the way one from the best who explained to the hadith by the way so what i'm trying to say is that the phrasing was again maybe not the best but the concept is every faith community right there are ah that they have to struggle with and there we have to understand how so in our understanding yes so what do we do with the issues of slavery every one of us any when we go through a phase no no the quran doesn't actually allow milky mean we have to go then we say oh it does actually no what do we do with that and it's something we have to go through and you have to understand i invited dr jonathan brown slavery and islam is a whole lecture listen to that right and even he has a good book on this as well that he as a muslim had to you know undergo what how do we understand these verses it was problematic for him as a muslim it was problematic for me as a teenager when i first came across the verses right so the problem is not in the quran in sunnah the problem is in our hikmah and lack of hikmah our struggling with it and the context clearly shows us in any case i seek allah's refuge if the wording wasn't the best but i also gently say to my my my critics said please listen to my hundreds and thousands of lectures about the quran about the sunnah about the then you come across 10 seconds right at a time and a place and a location that you don't know please have some islam i have defended the sharia and the quran and the sunnah and the syrah for my entire life now you come across something vague may allah forgive me maybe it wasn't the best wording but the concept was i'm trying to explain because the question was doesn't the quran allow slavery a non-muslim in two minutes how do you give dawah to them when he asks you about slavery i had a hikmah i had a methodology and i don't see a problem with that we say look this is an issue yes we as muslims we have to understand maybe we're going to have some issues with it now i'll move on to to hate to something else so how do you explain to a non-muslim audience immediately he is asking does your quran did you mean right how are you going to explain to a non-muslim this regard and in a way that you move on to something more important i employed a tactic with utmost respect to those that are finding this problematic themselves go and give da'wah and find me a better way and i'll follow it but i employ the tactics that even you as christians you have things in your book that you don't know what to do with even you as jews you have things in your book you believe in it but it's problematic for you this is the point we as well as muslims right we have allah says in the quran you're going to find this difficult but you must do it okay we are doing the same thing so the problem is in our own trying to understand the hikmah it's so clear now okay we we still have two criticism in this inshallah part criticism number nine which talking about al-hadud shaykh they accused you that you are rejecting or you said that it's not proper to be active in this time no again again i want people to listen to the entire lectures again this is something that um again maybe a lot mustang i don't know what to say this is an incorrect summary or misinterpretation i have been very clear and again with utmost respect one of the one of the the problems that we're facing in our times let me take a step back here one of the problems we're taking into facing at our times is people who don't have have taken on the responsibility to find the mistakes of people who have ill and they spread what they consider to be mistakes amongst other people who don't have him so any aalim or sheikh who listens to what i have to say i don't expect them to at all find anything i said problematic in this regard but when you don't have in and you are hunting for mistakes you will think something to be a mistake when it is not a mistake and you will make a big drama and create something out of it when it doesn't deserve anything of this nature what i have said is standard mainstream amongst many of the fukahab our times and i've always said that again with utmost respect it appears as if the people that are spreading these types of things they don't study uh the such the sharia also there are two separate chapters one of them is the book of fick and the other is see to sharia the book of very clear we have the hadood we study them and we understand this is what it means the punishment the punishments yeah now the issue of when and how to apply and when to manifest this is a separate topic called they accuse them so so well that's their perspective and this is eritamia has a book on this and everybody knows this yanni yeah so the books of are not meant to be a constitution for a muslim country the books of are taught to understand how and when you take the on a political level on a societal level is a separate science of which is a more advanced science and even many basic students of knowledge don't study it because it's not a basis as a very advanced science now what is well known and it's not just me that is saying this is that in given our world that we live in and given the reality of nation states and given all that is taking place to what level can we rethink through the application i have never said arudhu billah that we're going to make of the application of the urdu i have never said the abrogation i have never said we're going to consider the the the books of the shariah the question arises that what can we do in a modern country in malaysia in pakistan in libya in tunisia let me give you a simple example to my critics here is there any islam in the world in the world that is calling for jizya upon ahledima in their own countries do you know any adam in the world that is saying nowadays no why why why is no allah says in the quran is in the quran and jesus in every book of everybody so one ana and this is again what frustrating allah give me patience what frustrates me well i i utmost respect many of my critics really haven't studied there is said this in isis group isis yeah they are not ulama by the way okay never isis never had actual ulama isis has self self-taught for me for you for every uh why is it that they're not calling for jizya right now why because they understand that okay given the current circumstances right the sharia allows us to not do the jews is any of these uh gonna say that jizya was bothered in the quran nobody's gonna say this that allah revealed in the quran so the same thing every mainstream adam is saying it unfortunately these you know uh uh critics of mine they they're not even aware uh of what it's as if i have said something new it's as if they've never yeah this is the the default of every single shaykh uh that is active in the real world and the public in the political scene i have spoken to shaykh al-bawi directly uh one of the senior uh of the western world he passed away moved people are aware of him in south africa one of the seniors i had a long conversation i still have his whatsapp messages on my phone i went over this issue as well do you also agree with me that when it comes to blasphemy and when it comes to these types of issues modern muslim countries can rethink through to what punishment they apply maybe not uh execution we can send to jail for example right because we don't want any this to be compiled but at the same meaning of allah but at the same time can we rethink through you know uh you know some of allah's messenger in the modern state all i'm saying can we rethink through for a temporary time frame i'm not even saying i never said that you know the books of battle and nor am i saying this is permanent i'm saying in the current climate just like jizya another question i have which islam is calling for uh rick and me right now other than isis other than isis nobody why allah says in the quran and the prophet which book it was so in every book of faith uh slavery and whatnot every book of why is it not being applied now because a hundred years ago a movement began in muslim lands by the way this is an interesting story as well even in muslim lands there was back and forth and some illinois said how can you make haram what allah has made halal and the other say we're not making it haram we are saying right now in the current world we should abolish we are not saying it is saying it was sinful for the people of the past but we're saying now right we have to abolish can you that's the and this is what unfortunate and this is why we live in a time of fit and aware a person who doesn't know is given a platform on social media and able to confuse the people that oh look he is going against is different than and what i'm talking about is not first yes yes the political application of these laws right and honestly it's so basic and that is why no aalim will find what i said problematic no alim because i am preaching what the ulama taught me this is exactly what the uh have taught you is that syasa to sharia is different than but what we have now is uh a lot of jahal and also a lot of zeal and hamas a lot of overzealousness where it's when they see islam becoming very very very liberal which it is i agree with this anybody who preaches something they think is in that direction he becomes liberal and modernist no you don't understand what is liberal and modernist in islam in the first place you don't you don't have the tools to know that not every easy opinion means just becoming liberal la yani sufyan authority is famous there was a suffering i forgot famously said that is not one to preach the strict opinion everybody can preach the strict opinion is one to preach the lenient opinion and that is the correct one that is where real faith comes in so the real fakie is not the one who follows the strictest opinion all the time no so again all that i have said in this regard wallahi i don't know what else to say it is mainstream it's not problematic but people who haven't studied and they haven't heard it in english and they've only studied basic they find it problematic actually what i have said is the position of every single major scholar of every muslim land and that's why they themselves are not calling for buddhia they're not calling for jizya they're not calling for so many things no muslim land today no muslim land applies the shiddya 100 percent why even so there even why why because they understand is different than the books of that's all i'm saying nothing strange in this regard last criticism in this part is why shaykh is supporting yusuf so i'm not a blind father of any sheikh but i respect and i respect every special respect respect all of them uh each one has something to benefit the ummah and i believe that overall his methodology is something that appeals to me but it doesn't mean i agree with every single opinion and the reason why i sometimes quote his name is because my critics sometimes make it out as if this opinion is i'm the first person in human history or the only person saying this and i'm just quoting one of the most respected and senior ulama in the world alive today may allah is going to protect him even if you disagree and there are many who disagree with him even if you disagree just understand that he he are you going to deny his right to vichti had can anybody say that he is not a much of our time yeah he said it's he is not him he makes a lot of things okay so that's their opinion that's their so that's their opinion i i i don't i cannot respond to that level of jihad that level of ignorance if you're gonna be allowed call an alim like this and you're right somebody wrote a book of their group and it is published i am more of this book right i don't even want to respond to this in my opinion is one of the greatest ulama of our era that's all i'm saying one of the greatest and she's also one of the greatest by the way is one of the greatest and i studied and i studied washington and wrote me a task and i studied with meaning i should not say study i attended uh uh met went to his husband multiple times i studied with i am i consider myself a minor mind your mind you are staying in your knees there and and i consider and i consider shaykh to be one of my main spiritual mentors even if i respectfully respectfully disagree with some of his opinions but my love for him has not changed at all and i really think he is willing and i think he is i think he's been he's one of the remnants of the salaf and i saw with my own eyes but what has this got to do with having to agree with every opinion of his can we not understand you can respect the sheikh and disagree with the opinion i love ibn uthima allah i hope to be resurrected insha'allah in the company of the righteous and i hope he is amongst them but that doesn't mean i agree with i met him multiple times i have an interview with him on uh recorded and i asked him some very uh deep and and interesting questions about harm and whatnot and i respect him and i have said publicly that when i was in my twenties my mind gravitated more towards ibn uthamian and ibn baz and and uh and the ulama of the salafi movement and as i grew older without any anybody influencing my own mind now i am more towards the type of thicker the type of methodology that one finds that's what i have said it's not that i'm a blind follower at any of them i respect all of them but in my own maturation i have gone from this to that my critics have the right to to criticize that's their business by the way said literally about hadith it's mushkil also yes he also said this yes exactly muslims literally that he read the book of al-halal and he was respecting and he wrote with his hand that this book is great except five fatahi doesn't agree about only five fatahi said everything is halal they accuse him in this way but uh the great sheikh sheikh bin baz said literally and he wrote this with his hand that kitab halal haram is great except five uh just as i have to say it we will continue all these criticisms foreign me