Intellectual Foundation of Islamic Civilization

Transcript Details

Event Name: Intellectual Foundation of Islamic Civilization
Transcription Date:Transcription Modified Date: 5/18/2019
Transcript Version: 1


Transcript Text

SMIL r-rahim wa salatu was-salam wanna

shut up an MDI one more sitting by the

eddy here I even offer him also have the

teehee on until they are only axon and

EDA unit Dean what October to do nothing

hum Dillard's about the hot dogs I had a

friend who came from Persia and he

arrived in London and he was going to

study there and so on Englishman picked

him up part of the university and he

told him he was hungry so he said oh you

have to come I know this place that has

the best hot dogs and he said my dear

friend in my country we neither eat dogs

hot nor cold

now I had that Englishman taken the

advice he wouldn't be susceptible to

what they now call mad cows disease

although we didn't need any scientific

studies to prove about the madness of

the beef eaters so but that's a that's

one of the nice things about difference

of opinion if you tend to follow the

more strict one you rarely get in

trouble so about eating beef in this

culture I for me it's not an issue of

halal or Haram it's really an issue of

Ayub or hadith which is pure and impure

because if you notice in the Quran when

Allah mentions haedong he always says

had Adam by a bet that follows haddad

which means how not just how / missed

ball but a year which means pure and one

of the Quranic injunctions is to look

for escapa amma in solitude calf the

purest of food so what you you know

build your cells within your bodies is

based on the food in fact there's a

twentieth-century naturopath in the

United States that coined the term you

are what you eat but in fact if you look

even IML josiya him wallah actually said

one of the reasons that it is prohibited

to eat the move Teddy sets meaning those

animals that that as what do they call

them carnivorous animals you know but

most eros is more than carnivorous it

means like something that really attack

other animals the hunter animals and he

said the reason is is because you don't

want to take on the qualities of that

animal and and so he had an

understanding that you know that what

you eat that's why the muslims

traditionally ate lamb because they're

gentle creatures they're not they're

humble and the Prophet this is a fact

the Prophet SAW lyceum said the people

who

who have camels are tend to be arrogant

people that that's true it's in a Hadees

sound happy they tend to be arrogant

people and the people that have Lam tend

to be gentle people and this is lamb and

goats

the early all of the prophets have

looked after lamb and goat because it

teaches that gentle quality in

characteristic what doesn't mean which

washing right gentleness is not

wishy-washy in other words there's a

time for Jib and harshness when the wolf

comes the Shepherd doesn't act like a

sheep right he acts like a wolf and

devours the wolf before the wolf devours

him or his flock so there's a time for

both but the dominant characteristic of

the prophets Eliza miss Rama not either

although he also has a quality that is

hidden or that seriousness that

necessitates at times severity I just

want to say about the some of the things

that I wanted to cover were covered by

chef Jemil

before me but just generally about the

Islamic intellectual heritage I think

the first thing there is a modern

concept or an idea that I've noticed

that some people have that Islam is

somehow a simple religion that it's

presented as this simplistic what guy

eaten in the destiny of man calls the

boyscout religion and I think that

that's a great disservice to the

tradition of Islam because the Quran

actually directs the message to what are

called allah al bab the people of

innermost core Lube is depth lube is the

thing that is the innermost thing of a

fruit the lube is the inner most and so

the people who the quran really is

speaking to are the people that have

depth that have innermost core now there

is a hadith that says hadouken watanabe

own that the people of Tonopah are

destroyed that happy is sometimes

translated as those who delve too deeply

into matters get destroyed which is

really a disservice to that hadith

because the Hadees is actually talking

about the Rabbinical deviation which is

to go into great detail about matters to

the point where you get lost in the

detail and then can't see the big

picture and those people get destroyed

and those are the people that will go to

such an extreme about every little picky

detail and they get destroyed by that

tendency and so the Prophet SAW lisen

was warning about that and he said yeah

c'mon Luther Deen

beware of extremities in this teaching

were also in the hadith and elbow hadith

Lenya shed Medina had only loved Alaba

no one goes to that extreme and he's not

talking about depth or proven duty of

understanding he's talking about

becoming picky in the details or

attempting to encompass the whole of the

Islamic teaching because the teaching

cannot be encompassed by any one

individual and that's why we are on Ouma

we are a body of believers and the body

if you look at it is not the same thing

even though it's structural foundation

is based on cells the cells make up

different organs different elements

different aspects so the body has bones

and the OMA has bones it has a

structural foundation which is is the

Islamic hokum or the governance it's the

the system of justice that is

established by the people of Justice and

then it has the heart which is the heart

of Islam is the people that are

maintaining the life of Islam both its

intellectual and spiritual they're

pushing the blood to the far reaches of

the body and the lifeblood of this Deen

is is in and by him

going to go into that inshallah by

knowledge we don't understand it as

information the Muslims have never

understood in as information because if

knowledge was information what that

means is is that the Orientalist is an

alum you see the one who studies like at

McGill or Harvard University Islam and

learns all of the different aspects of

Islam and can come and give a lecture in

a Masjid and give you tafseer of Quran

and quota for Toby and even al arabi and

all the Abu Bakr and ivory and all of

the great Mufasa Dean and even his he'll

just make you amazed and yet what is at

the essence disease vehicle be him model

he has a disease in his heart and his

diseases in AD its obstinacy that he

hasn't submitted to the message so the

annum is never the one who has the most

information and the idea here is in the

words of him America rattle on when he

said they said any cutter to rewired

knowledge is not having a lot of rewired

of a lot of narrations wa lakin alma

neuron Halawa who Allah who via Alban

movement but not true knowledge is a

light that a lot of places in the heart

of the believer and that light is the

light that is the result of the the

intellectual aspect of knowledge

literally beginning to merge with the

flesh and blood of the human being

it's what even Raja for Hungary calls

MOBA genre tool in albin movement when

the the knowledge literally begins to

have a penetration into the heart of the

movement and begins to permeate the life

blood of the movement and so this

knowledge is literally in and reading

the human being and he becomes gem she

the nor he walks with this light and

this really is the essence of Islamic

knowledge neuron Allen or it is light

upon light in other words the

informational aspect the the analytical

aspect the intellectual aspect is norm

but then

new or it's on another light it's light

upon light and that can be looked at

also like father Dean arrazi rahamallah

and his great tafseer which has been

maligned in this present age they say

fee equal fee

kullu shay'in illa tafseer in it is

everything but tafseer a great untruth

one of the superb intellectual

contributions to this Ummah is that book

despite the fact that there are aspects

in it like any book that need to be

watched carefully and avoided because of

some of the influences that that he was

affected by through Hellenistic thought

and ideas but this has never been a

reason to reject the knowledge of a

people by certain cultural influences

that exist at a time the Muslims have

never done that to their scholars we

have always taken and benefited from

people if you look at the great the the

great rhetorician of Islam is a machete

he is accepted by the ulama as being

really the pinnacle of understanding in

Bulava despite that fact his tafseer has

some dangerous ideas in it that have

been rejected for centuries by the

Muslims because he was up the Martez

elight school he was a marked sed and

for that reason I've never met an alum

of any worth that didn't have his book

in their library and yet they will say

you have to watch out what he says sort

of the tech wheel for instance in the

chapter of Turk we're you don't pay any

attention to his design but that doesn't

mean you don't benefit from the man's

knowledge and this is the difference now

I'll tell you interestingly in this

modern period and this is part of the

fascism or the Terrorism intellectual

terrorism of certain elements there are

certain

elements that have bought up publishing

houses in the Muslim world and they have

actually altered text and taken out

sections and this is called Keanu to

none

it's treachery in the narration and the

Muslims have never done that they've

left everything in the books that the

island put in there and I've seen this

with my own eyes because I had a copy of

a book which is the tafseer of a mimosa

we added JAL Elaine and there was a

section that was whited out and somebody

I saw an edition when I was in West

Africa that was published in the 1940s

in Egypt where the section wasn't

whitened out and it happened to talk

about a certain group of Muslims that

the Imam wasn't pleased with and this

certain group of Muslims published the

later edition of that book and took out

they whited out the section now in the

most recent edition which I have seen

they didn't even bother that you know

these Widing it out you know whom I

wonder what was there before

now they because of computers you can

just delete they moved it up so there's

no whiteout anymore so this is a danger

if you think about it you know what

happens to the books of Islam especially

computerization it's actually quite a

frightening thing because with

computerization things can be added to

books and computers are a double-edged

sword you know like everything else in

life it has dual edged and one of the

problems with this sword is there's

really not a handle in other words

though it's just the blade so it's very

dangerous you know I mean this internet

thing

for instant people somebody put out a

whole thing about me that just made up

completely like a biography and I was in

England and Jim in fact chef Jemil was

there he had left he had to go somewhere

else but they introduced me and this man

started reading this biography of some

day I've never even heard of except the

out the same name as me and I said

I said what's that he said your

biography I got it off the internet I

said I won't even let you know right

that's I don't even know that person

throw that away and now it's in the data

sphere right you can't even pull it back

if you wanted to so I mean this is a

danger of this whole thing where people

don't write their names which is another

part of our intellectual tradition

scholars always put their names on books

and now there's books published where

they don't even put their name on it

so you don't even know it'll say

something like much more to Mennella

Dudamel like a group of the Ummah who

are they I want to know who they are

I saw one thing a fatwa that was put out

from South Africa by modulus Alou Lama

and it doesn't say who they are and it

was a company knit it was amazing

because it was a fact that were based on

the hanafi madhhab that even got the Med

have wrong I mean they were quoting

about Juma had to be in Arabic and Abu

Hanifah Abdullah know is is one of the

Imams that says it doesn't have to be

and you can look even in the short hala

Marathi and fella it'll say with a

second hook but to what I will parasya I

mean this is Hanafi Mehta the hoopla is

valid even if it's in Persian which was

the dominant language of the atom at

that time where our Hani Ferelden Locker

was so that's the dominant position his

head Medhat but they put it out like no

it's Haram to give a Papa in Arabic

which in the monarchy fit yeah you can't

give a hot but in Arabic even if there's

no Arabs you pray the whore according to

your mom attic also according to Ahmed

but Imam Shafi and Imam Abu Hanifa

permit the hot bath in Arabic and so

here's an example of a group that didn't

even get there men have right which

makes it even more problematic and then

put out this fatwa and then people say

oh how long to give hot pan Arabic they

read this thing it says much lesser

ulema

it's from the Council of the ulama

heman Mishnah saloon Emma you know I

lose this matchless who I mean first of

all man Anna Anna Adam Papa jahida

whoever says I'm an Adam is ignorant

that's a party de in in fact one time I

said to this shift of one of my teachers

from Mauritania we were talking about

something and he said well it's like us

and he was referring to himself he said

anima Achilles a man the the the

scholars of the end of time and that was

a kind of self-deprecating statement

well I mentioned that to another Adam

and he said subhanAllah a diner in the

after as a man he's even claiming to be

an atom from the end of time so this was

something that was known like in the

Quran in surah Baqarah when allah

subhana wa tada says that way dot

eliyahu a tuxedo for our part in Amman

an emotion that in the human Massa don't

they're the Musa dune a Lima man oughta

be says why the anima dad is LA because

they claimed a slaw they said in an

anonymously home and anyone who says

there are mostly is not Muslim and if

you look at the saw at the eyes in the

Quran they always say the moon is

orbiting at the under moon is always

make us from amongst them in other words

it's not saying I am a Mormon

I'm a no it's saying make us amongst

them that's a statement of humility put

us in their company even though we're

unworthy of it and this is the

difference you see it's a very different

so just to look at you know in broad

strokes because that's all we can do in

any type of format like this is attempt

to look together at broad strokes the

the Islamic phenomenon is a phenomenon

of knowledge this is what it is the fact

that the first revelation that we all

know is Amara reads EPROM

this is the first revelation and it

comes amazingly enough to a man who

responds by saying ma Ana be a party I

don't know how to read now the beauty of

the Arabic language is that it has a lot

of equivocal terms terms that can mean

more than one thing re in the Arabic

language me

is to orally transmitted to recite or it

means to read it has both meanings so it

can mean literally to recite if you say

to somebody a para to whom inca saddam i

mentioned your piece to him in other

words I said assalamu alaykum to him or

acara mineus are on a para woman near

salam recite to him my salaam that's

saying to do it orally

now if you look at any human

civilization it is founded upon an oral

tradition before it is founded on a

literate tradition this any human

civilization and I think oma really

means civilization if you look at Olin

because on them the owner are these

civilizations they because of what OMA

does it's from the word Ummah

which means mother and the mother is the

humanizing element in society she is the