asked them how much money would it cost
to get them to honor them by eating them
and they said they you could give them
all the money in the world they wouldn't
eat they were horrified by that and then
he brings the Indians and who ate their
father's to honor them and he says how
much money to burn your fathers and they
were horrified by that and Herodotus
makes this comment about how customs are
so different even though they were both
honoring their their ancestors so just
in terms of how do you see this
incredible diversity of human expression
and and the relationship that it has to
this idea of a universal nature when we
talk about the filtra you know then some
of the most important verses about it
are like surah Deschamps in surah 13 you
know by the fig and the olive and so
forth by the sun and the morning
brightness so these are these are
chapters in the Quran which established
that human beings are perfectly created
and that there's nothing wrong about
them at all
but commentators say that one of the
reasons why they're preceded by the
oaths is because the oath in Arabic
means this is the literal truth it's
emphatic it's not metaphorical it's
absolutely so but it needs that emphasis
because no one would believe this and
you know that if you look at what people
do especially the evil they do this also
takes on so many forms it's impossible
to comprehend and it is very clear and
the other hadith we just denied as you
know just looked at a very small part
even the hadith I mentioned
left out two-thirds of the hadith just
for times sake you know but it's very
clear in our tradition that it is the
demonic more than anything else that
alters the human beings and they do it a
thousand different ways times a thousand
different ways if we would look for
proofs of the filter law then I think
one of the greatest proofs of that in
the 20th century is the great Austrian
[Music]
anthropologist Vilhelm it and he wrote a
book in German das poem this idea got
this Goethe cedilla the origin of the
idea of God never translated into
English and it's 12 volumes and you know
this book is really amazing because he
spent his life documenting all the
so-called primitive religions primitive
religions being what we call micro
religions their kinship groups that
don't have political structures
everything is determined by kinship and
these little groups that we call
primitive they're always very isolated
otherwise they wouldn't be that way and
there many of them especially in the
20th century there still were many that
are not there today and he showed that
all of them have the idea of the one God
no exceptions whatsoever none of them
are polytheistic in the sense of having
Pantheon's not a single one and he did
that also to refute lubbock and tyler
who were evolutionist anthropologists
who didn't do research by the way they
didn't do good research and they claimed
that religion begins with animism so he
showed that's absolutely not true and he
himself who was a catholic he believed
that this was a proof of ancient
prophecy and we wouldn't necessarily
disagree with him because these people
are so isolated and yet they have these
amazing similarities that pertain not
just to the belief in the one god
then they call by beautiful names you
know but also they believe in morality
they believe that marriage is given to
them by God they believe in heaven and
hell some of them even believe in the
sea rot the path that takes you to the
garden and so we would also say that's a
manifestation of football but like as
you said human beings no one has a
greater spectrum of potentials good and
bad than us right
the Nesta Webster who was regarded
before she went into conspiracy theories
and as a historian in one of her books
she makes that argument that the the
unitarianism was the aboriginal faith of
human beings that idolatry was was
secondary and and not primary so she I'm
wondering if she was influenced by that
well Arnold Toynbee was right that's one
of the main influences on Arnold Toynbee
and Arnold Toynbee who is really a
remarkable thinker and you know
historians sometimes are equivocal about
whether they want to accept him or not
because he's he does what historians are
not supposed to do which is to tell you
what it all means
but you know Toynbee I was very deeply
influenced by Schmitt and by others and
one of the interesting things about
Toynbee is that he believed that the
most advanced human beings who ever
lived were those of the Paleolithic of
the Old Stone Age and again he doesn't
say that just off the top of his head
they didn't build cities like we built
cities but they were spiritually very
far advanced and he bases that on a lot
of things but Schmidt's one of them well
you brought up Toynbee and I think you
were the first one that exposed me to
Arnold Toynbee that's kind of become a
very interesting reference that I go
back to at different times I think some
of the students I have actually read at
least the abridged
version of toy biz study in history but
one of the things that he talks about he
at the outset of the study he argues for
the differences like these differences
in civilizations and he wants to
understand where civilization originated
from and what produces it and he he
basically rejects race this idea that
there's racial superiority and some
peoples as opposed to others he
categorically rejects that but he does
make an argument that there are distinct
manifestations of civilization and one
of the things that again as human
expressions there's such an incredible
diversity on the planet of human
behavior and expression so which would
you do you see civilization as something
that unifies human beings in in in from
from a fifth sense that humans by nature
begin to create civilization you know
language is so important so when we use
the word civilization one of the
problems is that it defining the term it
comes from the word city so it's those
great societies that build big cities
like Rome and so forth and this is where
in our tradition we use the word I'm
wrong and I'm wrong to me is a much
better word because of the fact that it
has nothing to do with cities it means
bringing things to life you know it
could be preferred to better ones just
as although we have al-hilal and Alaba
do but you know I think that you know
with with Toynbee and you know his
concept of civilization this focusing on
these civilizations that are big States
and so forth I think that that's if we
had a broader spective it would be good
of course when he talks about human
beings in the Paleolithic then he's
taking that broader perspective but
Toynbee also believes very much
what he calls the creative minority and
one of the most important ideas in point
B is that history is always the work of
minorities and therefore more minorities
that are galvanized and that have
solidarity they will lead and they will
have great effects and he believes that
civilizations like those of Egypt and
those of Mesopotamia and those of
ancient China the Yellow River Valley
Civilization the Yellow Emperor that you
know that these begin by creative
minorities and creative minorities are
always inclusive and they're not
oppressive and they're great gift to
human beings and in fact maybe hitomi
hints at this but we could easily say
that they're prophetic and he emphasizes
the fact that to do civilizations like
those of Egypt or Mesopotamia or the
yellow valley in China is such an
immense human undertaking that
essentially can't be done without a
prophet it's got to be done with
something that can you know give us
divisions in labor and a whole way knew
of weight in a new way of living but
then the civilizations usually become
civilizations of domineering or dominant
minorities and then they oppress and
they become the they become you know the
Prophet they become the property of the
elites and then they create which time
what time because the proletariat's
using that Marxist term but you have an
internal proletariat which are the
oppressed people in the society and you
have an external proletariat which are
usually better when people's who are
also oppressed by that civilization he
would regard the pre-islamic Arabs to be
the external proletariat of the
Byzantine and Persian empires okay so
they have to keep their distance but
they also learn from them how to use
weapons
and usually they can often conquer them
as well but I sort of forgot the
questions well yeah okay it's fine let
me let me look at something else here
that you brought up the idea of moving
because you spoke very beautifully about
the Adamic nature and that human beings
are these incredibly honored creatures
but there's also in the quran in san
which is a difficult word to translate
you know it's the intimate being it's
the being that that represents the
essence it's that dying you know the in
san is the essence of the of the the the
i but the in son is also talked about
potato in Sonoma Clara you know that
that in Santa Julio Kahului you know the
human being was created in angst and
anxiety he's called a jewel in the Quran
he's hasty he's oppressive you know ya
Johannes in the Mubarak inada and fusco
your oppression is against your own self
nasa talking to all humanity Marvin I'm
now who are economists um Kennedy Albany
moon we didn't oppress them but they
were oppressing themselves so there's
also this other side of the human being
that is actually very negative in the
Quran and obviously the Christian
tradition deals with that with the idea
of the Fallen human being how would you
address that aspect of the human being
so this is also part of the futur all
that it has the negative capacity right
and it is forgetful and it has to be
forgetful because then it can't use what
its Vitolo is for which is to rediscover
it and when we come into life we believe
that all children until the age of
maturity or sometime after that they're
Saints you know because of the fact that
they have this fitrah and they're also
not morally responsible they're not
moral agency you know but then as the
passions develop in us then these
passions you know the the idle of the
pig the idol of the dog anger and
appetite
you know they will necessarily veil us
from who we are so you have this seeming
contradiction between holy people in
Sanyo hell you are either Meza who shall
rue Jews who are with either a mystical
faith oh man you are so we have this but
again our commentators make it very
clear that this is a particular type of
human being you know here's a human
being who's not true to his or her foot
law and what was the other part just you
know that idea of looking at the human
and all these negative qualities so
would then human nature if we if we say
there is a human nature that's universal
I mean you'd exceed that we would insist
but but for us the nature and from that
hadith that began the talk the nature
the human nature is really a nature of
potentialities of is of capacities and
and so the actualization and we have the
concept of it an incentive common you
know this idea of the perfectible human
being that can move towards a kind of
wholeness or completeness which is a
restoration of that of that first being
is that is that mmm is that how we have
that and you know of course I'm a
convert this beloved brother is a
convert many of the people here are
converts and I remember when I became a
Muslim which was early January the 3rd
1970 and then as I went through that
first year there were certain dilemmas I
had in my heart from before like an
emptiness even though I had been
religious and that was filled
you know believe it or not you could
actually see your face changing in the
mirror
especially in Ramadan like can I do this
can I fast this I've never done that in
my life and then you just see yourself
changing and so it's this is manifest I
think to most people who come into the
faith and I remember when we were in
Spain Sheikh Hamza was also part of that
that we had a particular person come to
us from the mountains he was from Madrid
he came from a Stalinist background he'd
become a Buddhist he was in a black suit
that he could sleep in or keep him warm
he did his own Buddhism and then all of
his buddies joined us and he was we
later called him ice man you probably
met him and when he came to us he was
frightening you know his eyes were like
about to pop out of his head yeah and we
had a madrasah which comes a I met him
there and we had it was an Andalusian
type of school and you know we had a
little door with a open for the window
you know it's like a window to the door
to know who's knocking and when he
knocked at the door the brother who went
to open it shut it just like that it's
like and then he says oh my god like
what if he becomes a Muslim you know
we've got enough crazies in the
community already
and he kept knocking and if finally we
had to let him in and then in Nelly lie
he were in LA he wrote you know he took
the Shahada we thought oh my god what
are we going to do and I know my wife
Samira remembers him really well and
like within three weeks you could not
recognize him and he was also a
professional Acrobat and I would watch
him from my office looking over the
garden and he couldn't take two steps
without doing us a big skipped and the
way that Acrobat skip is not the way you
skip and he became he became the most
beautiful person in our community and he
became a person that you know anything
you wanted done even cleaning your house
even doing your laundry
you know sacrificing a chicken he would
be the one to do it so again one of the
most important things is you can come
back to the football and that's why we
say the filter can be altered but it
can't be substituted for something else
my wife and I when we were at Michigan
where I began to teach in 1978 you know
we were in student housing because I was
an assistant professor who's always poor
and she was also completing her
education that we were in the Graduate
housing and there was a woman there who
was a feminist she was divorced with a
child she was a law student and I don't
know why but she liked us we liked her
and we always argued and she's always
talking you have you can't get in a word
edgewise and then you know one spring
day and she's talking about you know
that how horrible religion has been to
women and we say that women are
religions best friends that religious
not necessarily their best friend and
you know so one spring day she was out
we were out in an open area and her son
was there he's about three years old
and he was having a big time and then he
got over to where the cars were parked
hmm you know on a street both sides of
the street and there's a car coming down
the street really fast and he's going
out between the cars and then she
notices him just at the last moment
where did she say oh my god
I swear she said oh my god and the car
slammed on its brakes and it screeched
and there was crying and yelling and he
escaped by an inch of his life
you see and then and this is what the
Quran says that anyone who calls upon
God in dire need he will answer their
prayer that was st author which she did
which is coming out of what her fitful
but when the fitara is veiled over it
only shows itself to be what it is in
times of great fear mm and this was a
time of great fear I can't lose my son
and also times of great joy and that can
they say there's no disbeliever in the
foxhole so but the ability of the fits
order to come back this is very hopeful
for us isn't it and this is one of the
important things about studying the fit
role because people can get so far away
from it and every we can take a thousand
different paths but you can come back to
it actually very easily the you know
about women I like that that they're the
best friends of religion but religion is
not always their best friend and that's
something for centuries women were seen
that their nature was inferior to male
nature Aristotle asserts that and and
that was certainly you'll find that
creeping up in both Christian and Muslim
texts and there's a very interesting
verse I think it's in sort of about it
says a woman Eunice at validity of it
Osamu Mubeen and it's it's articulated
in the masculine
and yet most of the Memphis udon bubbly
Mujahid most most of them say it's
talking about women and and it uses the
maddening that much hold unis chef know
that they are enculturated into
ornaments you know ornamentation that
they're put up as ornaments women and
then they it they have an inability to
articulate that it indicates essentially
that it is inculturation that there's a
nurturing element and then if you remove
that because if if we say the woman's
nature is inferior like it has been
asserted by many many people in the past
then it leaves it
it's irremediable you can't you can't
alter that fact but if it's understood
as a nurture thing which we clearly see
especially in in in the 20th century
where women have been given equal
opportunity to in fact in many ways
they're exceeding the men now at a lot
of universities I think you saw that
when you were in teaching in the Middle
East
women were farming students they were
the best students in fact my whole
academic career women are the best
students right I mean that's that I've
even as a that's been our experience I
think that's a tuna men you know you got
to get to work well feed a dick FLE at
NFS and with NF you soon but but that's
a clear example of where a complete
misunderstanding about these differences
between male and female led to
oppression even from within religious
traditions and where that was understood
to be a nurture phenomena which I think
that ayah in the Quran indicates and I
think that's why it's put into the
masculine that the same would happen to
a man who was raised in that environment
where he's not allowed to to have his
intellect nurtured because he's more in
an ornament for the male of course when
we look at the prophetic history there
was this clear cultural difference
between the women of Mecca the Quraysh
and the women of Medina
where the profit went in his migration
and the women of Medina were extremely
articulate and they were warriors on the
battlefield
and of course they're women who live in
an agrarian culture because Medina was a
huge Oasis and usually when women and
men are doing the same thing then
they're extremely compatible and that's
certainly the way it was with the
melanie's women we had a Zoe
not long ago just a few weeks ago in
Egypt and we had our sister Maryam
Shivani I hope people hope you didn't
mind me mentioning her name but she
actually took hadith about women and
studied them very carefully and showed
how they're often misinterpreted but
that that's not really the valid
interpretation and you know so but the
women of Medina were extremely strong
and very outspoken and this is a Meccan
surah that you're referring to so you
would think come in my mind is it is
talking to the Meccans in terms of their
own culture and the women of Mecca were
they were very different because also
the city lives by international trade
and it lives also by the pilgrimage and
although women partook in that the men
are the ones who really do it so they're
there women tend to be much more subdued
they could also go on the battlefield by
the way but they weren't the kind of
warriors that the medon ease women could
be so but we do believe that men and
women have these perfect natures and you
know that the women are not debilitated
in any way by their nature and in
Islamic law you know it is a societal
obligation that women get knowledge
every type of knowledge right religious
knowledge just like men well I think
even out of you'd even argue that they
have spiritual advantages over men
that's what they say even out of you
even in one
part of the futa hot Makia he talked
about a saint a man st. who spoke to God
with there was a feminine voice and I
had the honor of reading that with a
Moroccan scholar and explained to me
that this is very common in that
tradition the you know the and that you
know if you don't have that feminine
voice you can't really attain the
highest spiritual level one of the good
books by the way you know that for
people interested in that is the Tao of
is Sachiko Bharata right by Murata it is
the first thing she wrote she was a
Japanese convert to Islam and it's a
very good book that translations are
really good in Arabic and in Persian but
later on she would discover Chinese
Islam and then she becomes one of the
authorities in Chinese Islam if she had
only had that knowledge of Chinese Islam
the book would have been even more
beneficial than it is but the Tao of
Islam is a very very amazing book to
read and it's about the male principle
and the female principle you have in in
the pre-modern world I think as far as I
can tell most civilizations agree that
there was a human nature certainly the
Islamic did even the the Indyk and the
Buddhists and traditions would have
understood that as well and the Buddha
nature was a potential that could be
realized in any human being you you also
have certainly in the Christian
tradition the idea of human nature they
they might differ on certain aspects of
his potentialities but essentially the
idea of a unified nature since the
Enlightenment period people like Hume
who reject human nature and then in the
20th century you get like merleau-ponty
says something like the only nature that
humans share is that they share no
nature
or you get somebody like Ortega y Gasset
who also denies human nature and and I
think modern there's in fact Pinker who
who's at Harvard Steven Pinker wrote a
book called the blank slate arguing that
that there is a human nature and very
troubled by this negation or denial of
human nature one of the things that
we're seeing now is the idea of a fluid
nature that human beings can can they
might be born into the wrong body for
instance so I have a feet I'm a female
trapped in a man's body
and instead of seeing that maybe as
dysmorphia or some type of mental
illness that needs to be treated it's
now being embraced even in children and
children are being encouraged in fact I
think in Sweden they're doing non-gender
child rearing where the children wear
the same clothes the traditional pink
and blue for instance that people would
if it was a girl they would give at the
wedding shower they would give all these
nice girly type things and this is the
argument that this is simply
inculturation
that this is nurture all not natural and
that that the nature of in fact Crowley
Aleister Crowley in the book of the law
chapter 2 argues over a hundred years
ago that the time is coming soon when we
will be free of this binary and we will
be able to choose our own genders so
this is something that we're really
seeing happening all over now and young
people are really encouraged I actually
saw a East Asian man if you can believe
this I saw a Pakistani man with a nose
ring and I was amazed at that because I
think in that culture I think maybe in
some of the Hindu castes or something I
don't know but in that culture a man
would not wear a nose ring as far as I
know but the this is kind of the
throwing off of cultural decorum and
this idea how
would you address that just from this
denial of human nature that we're seeing
in the 20th century and the 21st century
you know that on the level of the
horizontal which is you know if you live
in a world where you only explain things
by reference to other things like them
that's like a horizontal universe then
there is no meaning there and there
there are no immutables and there's no
truth either and atheism agnosticism
they require a horizontal world and once
you put in the vertical connection which
is to look up to heaven and to look to
first principles the law of
non-contradiction the excluded middle
law of identity causality possibility
necessity and possibility then you've
got a tenth and then you have a
structure and then you have also meaning
so a lot of the things that we see in
our time is because of this Cartesian
worldview that we have where we don't
even know what's out there we don't even
know that it is out there we can't
relate to it and you know so you have
these all these social experiments and
most of these social experiments around
gender they go back also it's very
important to study the genealogy of
ideas so that is a complex issue
Descartes is the one who gives us the
concept of mind in its modern sense and
his is sexless which is something we say
is a fundamental mistake but and it's
also important genderless but you have
Karl Marx Sigmund Freud Vilhelm Irish or
IC age sexual revolutions from him and
he means revolution he means revolution
and you only win that revolution when
incest is best okay it's it's got to go
there and then you have also Herbert
Marcuse a
he was a big deal here in Berkeley in
the 1960s eros and civilization and so
forth and then you have Judith Butler
and of course what you're talking about
as you know I didn't know she was in
Israel
no no she teaches here at UC Berkeley
okay I didn't know that but so it's very
important to know who gave you this idea
and where did they get it from and what
are their first principles and so much
of modern thought doesn't even have
first principles and therefore for us we
want to get our orientation correct and
we want to know why do we believe what
we believe where do we begin
how does the intellect work most people
don't even know today what intellect is
intellect doesn't need anything outside
of itself and of course you've heard
about that in the debunking of the
syllogism and things like that but
that's not true in any Universal
statement like existence and
non-existence the syllogism works
perfectly because you have excluded
metal you distribute the middle term and
you know so for us you know
and I think this is one of the great
things about Zaytuna is that we learn
our tradition where we get our ideas and
how we know them and we also learned
that the West is a tradition right and
that these ideas don't drop out of the
sky there are certain people that are
behind them and I feel that one of the
most eloquent ways to address these
issues and most objective ways is look
at where the ideas come from the idea of
first principles and again that's
getting to something that is deeply
rooted in the essential nature of the
human being the law of non country
that's fit also for us you know that you
know the law of non-contradiction you
know the law of the excluded middle you
know the law of identity you know that
this is shaped from the use of
this is shake up the law they're not the
same I was not like you and now him he's
now you when I taught logic I taught
them identity was Popeyes law I am what
I am
[Laughter]
these are very important and if you look
at most modern thought if you look at
Stephen Hawking you know you know the
theory of everything it's because
everything's a model right Stephen
Hawking it says this chair is not a
chair it's probably a molecular
structure probably and my model is what
makes it a three-dimensional brown chair
so this is Cartesian dualism and
therefore and it's also it's it's the
content this idea that there's no
correspondence because I think Muslims
were very much committed to
correspondence truth and that's exactly
what the fitna is that's why the
festival to see the Fatah it enables you
to know the world because you've got it
in you you know we say the critiques of
modern science they say that physics
doesn't believe in red apples okay
because it just believes there's
molecular structures that you make into
an apple and it tastes sweet and it
nourishes you but it's all about
probabilities and and this leads to a
type of Gnosticism they're there and and
I think we're very much in a gnostic
world in many ways even despite the
materialism there there's an occult
element that's very strong this this
idea that none of this is real that we
can't know reality that that this this
might be just simply a celeb Cystic
worldview in my head we've got young
people now going in and shooting up
people in schools and it it's a complete
divorce of reality than that that
they're not really inflicting pain on
other people there's something it's
almost like they're in a matrix and they
perceive it as a kind of a
a game that they're doing so and that's
a very demonic reality I think that's
being a lot of people are experiencing
and I think one of the it's very
interesting that it's very related to
film and these games that people are
playing where they I mean the the
Decalogue that the second prohibition
the Decalogue which and i know you know
this book that in in amusing ourselves
to death Neil postman's over the good
book yeah the second chapter where he
talks about what why would a why would
there be a prohibition on making graven
images you know this whole idea because
we've entered into a completely image
based civilization where the word is is
being moved we're even speaking now in
icons you know in in these these these
that once you lose when you enter into
that image based culture you lose the
ability for abstraction for real
abstraction the ability to to understand
essences like the chair to understand
what makes a chair and why despite the
fact that you can have chairs that are
you take a dog the idea that you can
have a Chihuahua and a Great Dane and
see the dog eNOS that they share is
amazing like that human beings can do
that and and and seeing the also human
nature despite the fact we can look and
somebody in the Amazon or somebody in in
in in an Aboriginal culture that are
completely different from us in their
expression of their humanity and yet we
can still abstract that essential human
nature and see that this too is a human
being that's being lost in people it's
you know the image based culture where
people are divorced and enter into this
I mean I I see it as a with no events to
people afflicted with this but a kind of
autism that you know the Arabs
translated it as towads
you know this idea of going into the to
the individual self and lose
a sense of other you know so you know we
get our humanity I think you know from
looking people in the eyes and having
their companionship from our mothers our
great grandmothers or grandmothers or
aunts from the men and so forth of our
families and what happens to people who
were raised on video games and iPhones
and things like that and who get there
or Facebook or whatever I remember a
girl that was with us in Spain in
Rosales was a daughter of one of our
brothers and really amazing girl but
it's as if she couldn't even socialize
with the other teens that were there
it's always her phone it's like if you
want to talk to her send her a text and
one of our brothers in Chicago who's a
neurologist he told me about this
syndromes that they have you probably
know the name of it I forgot but it's
like people bumped their head today and
they have to go see him
it's like I have memory loss and he said
they they call this some kind of a
psychological disorder I don't know but
you know again I'm not a neurologist so
I can't really say anything about what's
what he's the one who deals with these
well we grow up in a very different ya
world but my belief this is just an
intuition is that they're actually
having memory loss because it's like
they're extremely weak
they're extremely vulnerable because you
know whatever strength we have in my
opinion is because you know we were with
human beings and these human beings gave
us our humanity and they gave us our
ability to meet with trials and
tribulations and and so this is you know
one of the things of course that we are
conscious of we need to be very
conscious of is what does this
technology due to our primordial self
because that primordial self needs to be
nurtured by other human beings who have
that
and you know so this is very important
in our time and you know to learn to use
our technology very very intelligently
and very wisely of course it gives us
tremendous benefits you know I'm able to
be here because of technology you're
able to hear me because of the
technology we're being filmed on it you
know so I don't believe that we I think
we should be thankful for it you know
but at the same time we have to know how
to use it and this is one of the things
which one of the great books on
technology is Jacques Ellul this was one
of our classics back in the old days and
Jacques a little warns about you know
how technology sets its own rules it
goes its own direction
I think the Jockey rules book is a
little bit problematic because we don't
want to make people so pessimistic you
know that they can't deal with the world
they live in but you know we have to end
there's one things that Alou says is
that the massification of society is
required for technology to have its
March so you have to break down
significant religious and social groups
who could apply principle right and this
is why also for us as people that should
be principled we want to be principled
then we have to also learn about these
things how do they affect us how are we
going to use them and and to live in a
way that's beneficial how many of our
people are destroyed on social media
right dr. jackson who many of you know
he said that social media is not going
to leave us a single leader I see a
single value a single principle well
that also the one of one of the problems
is this idea of the neutrality of
Technology and I think that's something
that one of the most important
influences for me on that because you
know I've talked a lot about and how
I've been talking for years about the
problem of
of image based media and and long before
this what it's come to now because I
this was pre-internet there there's a
book that is a big noob roses in ski
wrote called between two ages which he
wrote in 1969 and he talks about the
introduction of technology because he
was aware they were very aware of the
internet and all these things the arm
the US military has technologies that we
don't even know about and the internet
they were using the internet in the
Universities I think in 1969 or 70 was
when when it begins the actual first the
first transmission was from UCLA I think
just Stanford and it was they were going
to put like log L o G and it crashed
after L Oh so it was like lo and behold
and and one of the things I saw Verner
Hertzog's amazing documentary on the
internet and the first half is all the
positive aspects of it how amazing it is
which it is right I mean it's just like
my dictionary app I just I use it all
the time and they're so cool so it's
it's just amazing to have it and then
and then to have like all these Arabic
dictionaries literally in the palm of
your hand it's unreal but the second
half was on the dangers of the internet
and one of the things that there's
something really floored me was this
lady and I felt like you know ghazali
when the thief tells him he laughs at
him when he says you can't steal all my
knowledge I just spent two years right
writing it all down and the thief
laughed at him and said what kind of
knowledge is it that a thief can steal
it from you and and he said untuk aha
lauded the company he knew that God made
him say that and he vowed never
- he would always memorize after that
everything that he learned but there's a
woman in there it's a family and it's
one of the most depressing parts of this
documentary but they're all they look
very depressed and and the woman they
lost a daughter in a horrific car
accident and she had her head severed
and it was hanging off her body
but these looky-loos who drove by took
pictures of it and then they posted it
on the internet and then over time
people kept sending them to her to the
family and she here's what she said and
it really floored me when she said it
cuz I felt like unto Allah she said that
I think that the Internet I think the
spirit of the Antichrist has descended
into the internet and people that are
susceptible to it it just opens up a
kind of vileness and it's it's just so
interesting how vile people are on I
mean just cruel there's so much cruelty
you know one of the things I have I've
been asking somebody from Silicon Valley
maybe an engineer here I want a computer
a program that automatically erases
anything done on the internet that is
grammatically incorrect because it would
eliminate 99.9 percent of the trolls
because they always write in bad grammar
but be that as it may
there's something I think it's in
Thessalonians I'm I'm not sure I think
it's in second Thessalonians where Paul
talks about the mystery of iniquity and
and and the man of lawlessness the the
person towards the end of time you know
and this is obviously a reference to the
Antichrist but he says the mystery of
iniquity is already active in the world
and we have a tradition in our own
tradition where the Prophet Elias Adam
said that there's no fitna that has
occurred since the beginning of time
except that it's preparing for the
greatest fitna this anti Christic period
where people completely divert from
their nature
and and the fitrah is really so
perverted that people lose it and so
this what's happening now with so many
people turning away from faith and
godlessness being celebrated and
profanity being celebrated the idea of
of mocking religion which would have
been so unacceptable not that long ago
in most cultures in the world now it's
something it's it's just it is the bread
and butter of comedians it's it's it's
it's the Hollywood you know everything
is just really just making religion seem
like such a dark thing and there's so
many young people now you know they say
I'm spiritual but not religious or they
don't want to have anything to do with
organized religions I was telling to
join Islam because we're the most
unorganized religion perfer there is but
anyway what what what do you what do you
what do you say about that because the
Prophet said one of the signs of that
precedes the Antichrist is people stop
talking about the Antichrist and and it
seems like we're in a very anti Christic
world where you know the word that we
use of course for the Antichrist is
added gel and belief in him is
obligatory and it comes from dead little
and digital means to lie to you know
confuse to turn things up down upside
down some of our scholars say that what
the job does is he overturns the the
very principles of knowledge so that you
you no longer know that what is true is
true and what is false is false and this
is the age we live in because we don't
have even like if we look at Descartes I
think therefore I am ok well that
changes the whole history of human
thought because in traditional medieval
thought existence come
first yeah in our tradition also
existence comes first and then
epistemology so now for him epistemology
comes for us and then we don't really
know if we exist or not so we should say
I am therefore I should think yeah some
people say I am therefore God exists but
you know overturning the what we call
immutables immutables our first
principles immutables also for us are
the basic principles of prophetic law
the dispensation and the basic
principles of theological truth
necessary being possible existence a
change indicates temporality and then
the basic the rabbit of su Luke of the
moral path of self perfection these
don't change but the Dajjal makes them
change and then you have the immutables
made mutable and this gives you the
disasters which are the ugly signs of
the end of time as the Prophet said you
know the slave girl will give birth to
her mistress or her master and you'll
see barefoot naked poor shepherds vying
for each other sometimes camel Shepherds
buying free with each other in the
building of tall buildings so you see
that but then when we look at it we say
many people probably most they say that
you know the mother will give birth to a
daughter who would treat her like a
slave and of course we see that today
and you know and then you can see the
buildings you can go look at themselves
the them years old one of the signs at
the end of time is either born eager to
Mecca either item Mecca tab or a jet
column when you see Mecca guarded with
tunnels and you see tall buildings over
the tops of the mountains and know that
the hour has cast its shadow over you
you can go and see the hour doing that
the big tower but they call that bulge
aside they call the town of the yes
that's frightening as you know I went to
Mexico the first time in 1973 there
wasn't a single Tunnel anywhere it's
like where they come from but you see
then what happens is why does the girl
treat her mother as a slave or the boy
treat his mother as a slave or as a
slave that's mistreated because the
rabbit are gone that they don't have
sound belief they don't know first
principles they don't have the morality
okay so all that's and then when that's
done then she will do whatever she wants
to do and the same thing you look at the
shepherds vying with each other in tall
buildings so it means certain so Abbot
have been overthrown and among these are
a sound political order which should put
people in power who are capable of
leading and who lead us for our benefit
and not their own and then you have also
overthrowing a sound economic system in
which there is distribution of wealth so
you get all this wealth concentrated in
the hands of shepherds many of those
shepherds are shames and those are very
good people you know but they're not the
cloth that you make leaders from in a
time like this they can't deal with that
so the Dajjal this is what he does he
takes the thoa Abbot the immutables and
makes them mutable and changes them in a
thousand different ways right you know
Christ said to the woman accused of
adultery you know where are your
accusers because they all left and then
he said goings and sin no more
mm-hmm and and this is an age where it's
go there isn't do what thou wilt for
there is no more sin you know this is
the idea that the concept of sin is
being removed from the world and
anything that I do is my own business
that I am an autonomous agent that
nobody can tell me what as long as I
don't you know
a harm principle as long as I don't hurt
anybody
then I can do what I want I'm I want to
because we're the times coming to a
close but I want to the the Quran in in
the verses that you quoted from surah
tarom it says that this is the fitara of
God the the the principal nature that
God has created the human being on and
and then Latifa para nasa and they had
that God has fought para he's al father
you actually wrote about that in in your
book about that name which is a very
interesting name of God and and I think
it was it but our best didn't know what
it meant and he heard the the Bedouin
saying on a photo ha
you know I dug the well before you so I
was the first one so Farah is to make it
first or the original and I mean it's
interesting we call aboriginals you know
from the origin of man they have that
but it then it says let Abdullah little
Kela
and and you alluded to the difference of
opinion but even even Jews a preferred
the opinion that it was that the the
negation there was for prohibition and
not impossibility
you know like lan fe little jinns it
wasn't learn if allegiance it was lani
do not change it's a warning to change
do not change and what we're seeing now
is an incredible in the west and
increasingly affecting people in the
east what we're seeing now is a real
change of this fitrah that that it's
being altered in people and and how what
what advice would you give us to protect
that Principia later to nurture it i
mean we have this idea of Talia
Thalia and Thalia the at the emptying
out a vicious character and the the
feeling of virtuous character in order
to experience the divine if you look at
the hadith that are on the Fatah and I
have those in my book one of the things
we see in them is that there's nothing
easier for us than to live according to
our natures you know and it's very easy
for us to do that and there are thousand
ways back to your nature and the
traditional Islamic City was a Garden
City and to be a valid City and Islam
according to law you have to have land
you have to have water on that land or
above it you have to produce all the
food you need for your city in your city
you can't depend on the outside okay but
we were garden cities and we had animals
and lots of animals and we have a whole
law about green zones and things like
that that enable us to support those
animals and we believe in our tradition
I believe according to my teachers in
our tradition that without animals you
can't be human you know chickens are
amazing and if you do permaculture you
know how amazing they are yeah you know
and chickens will teach you a lot all
animals would do that so I think getting
back into the natural world
you know we you're going to have this
program on permaculture with our brother
ramiz Kent may the 21st till June the
2nd yeah and we had one in Spain last
summer and we made soil you can make
soil in eighteen days you need three
parts of carbon which can be sticks you
need two parts of nitrogen which can be
green grass and you need then something
else that catalyzes it like manure okay
one part and then again three two one
three and you water it properly so it's
not too wet it's not it's not too dry
and it's it's steaming in one day it's
full of life in order to have healthy
food you have to have
living soil not just nutrients you know
this is one thing they learned in the
organic movement and they learned it
from Muslim India by the way the organic
movement comes out of Muslim India and
you know so you know making soil you
know you should be a producer not just a
consumer of course you're a consumer a
lot of beautiful things to consume you
know but if your producer that's a
revolutionary act you can do it on your
apartment and I think of all the things
we did in that Zawiya making the soil
captivated people more than anything
else and you know I know of an example
of a young man in Australia he's
Lebanese
he came to 11 into Australia because
it's a Lebanese civil war there are lot
of Lebanese like that in Australia
Muslim from the north from Tripoli and
other areas and he felt he was treated
like you know by a ray in a very racist
way at least he felt that way and he<