t 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

didn't think he owed anything to

Australia and he actually said I hate

this country even though it took you in

as a refugee and he was taken out you

know to learn about the soil do some

permaculture plant trees and in the act

of planting a tree you know he put his

hand in the ground and he said that when

I put my hand in the ground everything

changed and he said I began to love this

country and I began to feel that I'm

part of it so contact with the soil

contact with animals contact with nature

contact with each other with other human

beings talking visiting these are very

important these bring us back to a

nature there are a lot of things I would

also say martial arts and there are all

kinds of martial arts as I'm sure

everybody here knows but martial arts do

something for you one of the big

problems with males in particular is

that we don't have initiations you know

whereas in traditional societies you

have initiation

that neighbors you to move from being a

boy to being a man women often don't

need that because their biological

changes are so powerful that they serve

as initiations but you know getting back

to nature you know you should learn the

language of nature the Aborigines who

are incredible people a crowd of

incredible culture you know they teach

children to listen and if a child asks a

question they say go ask your mother

what do they mean go listen to nature

listen to what nature says about this so

and you can do that here you have this

incredibly beautiful environment you can

find yourself a sitting spot in the

forest

you know people even tell you the best

ways to do that learn the language of

the forest learn the language of the

birds the birds will come to look at you

other animals will come to check you out

so these things are very good for us you

know getting in your body you know

getting out of in in dream time for

Aborigines is being in the center brain

it's not just about dreaming it's about

being out of this analytical brain it's

always worrying and always analyzing and

concerned about stuff you know get into

the center brain so I just think it's

very easy to come back the photo I gave

you the example of our brother earth man

in Spain and many of us have seen this

in our own lives I mean look at Malcolm

X you know how this man changed so

incredibly after the pilgrimage his

voice was even different you know so we

believe in that patron this is a belief

it's obligatory for us and again this

affects the way we look at the world

that there's no one out there who is

foreign to us there's no one out there

who's alien to us and you know may we

benefit you know in learning our

tradition again one of the great dangers

of this time

and this is you know one of the things

we have to be very conscious about in

secular institutions is epistemic

warfare you know which is warfare

against your epistemology and that's

what they did the Aborigines like you're

not even human beings

you're not even animals you're like

plants you can cut down the plant you

can take away its sibling you can take

away the little plants that's what they

did

you know but the amber and epistemic

warfare means your tradition cannot

generate knowledge I spent hours with

the Aborigines in Australia and with

ones who are like basically spirit

doctors everything they say is knowledge

you know for example they don't have a

word for health they have a word for

healing that's because you have to heal

yourself every day you have to get that

negativity out of you you know that's in

you and it's just incredible but also

you know when we defend our tradition

it's not because shouldn't be because we

romantic not because we lament a loss

past no it's because I know and this man

knows and you know that our tradition

generates knowledge okay so we can't

allow our the people who don't even know

our tradition to say it doesn't you

belong in a museum we'll give you a nice

place in the museum you did produce

beautiful things and you know epistemic

warfare is imperialism and a lot of our

institutions are that way they're they

say they're liberal but they're not

liberal to anything that doesn't agree

with our the with the epistemic

tradition that they have and you're very

blessed to be in this wonderful place in

this wonderful environment some of the

best libraries and and minds in the

world and I really hope that this

institution succeeds and I believe it

will I'm amazed because the last time I

was here I don't know how many years ago

it was maybe five or seven but I

remember coming into this place and it

wasn't even used yet but I mean you know

this is a great gift that's been given

to you

and do you have great teachers you know

many of them I'm looking at right now

and may we continue to do this and I

believe myself that we are here to save

humanity in a quantum failure on quantum

later on Latino collegiately nos you are

the best community brought forth for

human beings a mammal Buhari says how

you doin a salinas you must be the best

of all people to all people and people

today they really you know how long will

this last how long will this last you

know that you know like we have schools

in Naperville right now that one class

has in it three suicides and that was

unthinkable in the old days

suicide was virtually unthinkable you

have one school they had 30 suicides

this is not right

you know these are vital signs that are

being lost and you know we have to bring

ourselves to life but we have to be life

givers as well and when we do that we'll

find a lot of good people in this

society Christians and Jews and others

you know who are on the same page that

we're on in that and in Shaw we work

together in this it's very important and

you know when we do the right things

like permaculture to me it's win-win you

know and not only that when when that

you then find that some of the best

people in the world you know you you get

to know them and that benefits us along

you know I just when I when I was in

Mauritania there was a shake there his

name was Muhammad and I mean they called

me know and when I visited him I was

staying in shear hut but he would wave

his house I think it was twenty two or

three and we we used to go visit him his

dhikr was the Hassan at how seen he was

to recited every single day by memory

the whole thing and his do I was making

dua for the OMA much like that that's

what he did was he he was I think in his

80s

at the time and he told me I've never

wished for anything to be different than

the way it was but today I wish I was a

young man so I could go with you to mark

the Hajj to study and then he picked up

some earth and he said no see Hattie

Lika

that uptight man had he had he Oh

Malcolm Marshall he said my advice you

don't get far away from this this is

your mother

you know the earth and I think one of

the things that technology is doing is

it's really distancing people from just

being with with the earth and we're

fortunate to be in an incredibly

beautiful environment here there's a lot

of places to go so I think that's really

good advice just about being in in in

nature and we know the prophets all I

said I'm he was very deeply connected to

the natural world and that natural world

spoke to him and and and he spoke back

he's with jabba the hutt jabba dona had

one out you know walk barefoot in the

grass yeah it's incredible

it's not too cold I'm sure the matter do

I'm sure how fat insane Omar said that

remind yourself be like mad even Adnan

and walk barefoot sometimes right yeah I

said no more said even you know I mean

even when you wear your shoes you can

imagine that you're walking barefoot

you're feeling the earth underneath you

these things are all very very valuable

to us they're also very good for our

health and getting rooted and learning

to be human beings again right that's

one of the things we have to do but I

just emphasize it's easy to do that

mm-hmm it's not difficult even though it

would might seem to you impossible but

this is one of the easiest things to do

that's also God's mercy it's so easy to

come back and it's very difficult to

astray to go astray

because the point where we're at right

now

there was a lot of work put into that

over a lot of generations it didn't just

happen overnight

you know and there's a lot of money

invested in that as well and it's very

easy to come back and to be yourself and

to be natural and you know our religion

is a religion of service and love and

service and love you know everything one

last point in question to you you talked

also about beauty and the importance of

beauty the the prophets of Lies to them

when the man asked him about was wearing

nice clothes and a good Santa was that

from arrogance and he said no it's it's

it's a lot loves beauty and and and one

of the things that that I find really

notable about pre-modern people is that

they they adorned things they they

didn't have a lot of things generally

but what they did had they always made

beautiful and when I was in Mauritania

they started using Bic pens their

traditional pen was a bamboo pen but

they started using big pens but the

women would adorn them with leather and

make them very beautiful so they would

actually take the plastic and they would

just do a design on it and then put

little frills at the end of it and the

students would write with these pens and

when I asked one of the women why they

did that she said it's so ugly you know

the bigger pen you know and and what is

what is that thing in humans that wide

not just have a functional carpet why

put the Tree of Life on the carpet why

not just have functional walls why put

wainscotting with designs on the on the

I mean what is that and how do we

restore that because Muslims they

dressed beautifully even peasants

dressed view you know the Afghan

embroidery and and the the seborrhea

that the Egyptian fella wears with the

striped people really have become they

don't you don't see the the

the the Caliphate of God in that in that

human being anymore and how is that

restored you know traditional societies

you should tell me any traditional

society that was not beautiful you know

look at the first nations of this land I

mean look at the Inuit you know the

Eskimos we're really a civilization

there are on that's a good example of

I'm wrong that doesn't have cities but

everything they did was beautiful

look at the Aborigines you can't believe

how beautiful everything they they they

make is and we were like that too we

were a highly skilled society we were a

society of crafts and everything guilds

and everything we made was beautiful and

that's because God is beautiful

and he loves beauty beauty is the

splendor of truth' you know and that

means God doesn't love ugliness and

ugliness is the mark of falsehood

ugliness means you've gone astray so you

know getting this back again I believe

it's going to be easy and again if we

look at say tuna and if we look at many

of the brothers and sisters that are

dear to us look at the beauty they they

they they create you know so God is

beautiful if you love God you become

beautiful you become internally

beautiful that's the universal routing

and then what you produce is graceful

and beautiful even the way you walk even

the way you talk even the words you use

because you want to use beautiful words

you want to know what your words mean so

this is very important to get back this

beauty and everything and that makes us

human you know that Alma to Dede who is

one of our great theologians he talks

about how God holds us back from evil by

putting us in a natural setting we still

do evil but the natural setting is

telling us this is wrong this is wrong

this is wrong what happens however when

you put people in an ugly setting of

broken windows

you know

you know broken glass in a graffiti you

know rats so forth it you can't believe

there's such a thing as truth anymore

you can't believe that there's any such

a thing as goodness anymore and that's

what beautification is something we have

to do to ourselves and in Islamic art I

believe the highest form of art is

architecture architect and and in our

tradition architecture is what generates

so many other forms of incredible art

you know but our art according to some

it begins with clothing some would say

it begins with the mihrab the recitation

of the Quran the writing the Quran but

clothing is one of the first things and

we we believed in beautiful clothing and

who didn't all traditional people were

like that you know and it showed their

identity it showed their honor and it

showed what they believe in who they are

you know but we wanted clothing that

would be beautiful we want a clothing

that also we could pray in and not be

embarrassed you know you look at their

Eid prayers you know in Nigeria and you

can put it National Geographic you look

at us praying I eat prayers it's like

please don't take a picture in tell her

you know sitting up or standing up again

right except for the sisters they're the

ones that come off okay but you know we

wanted to call so clothing that would

look good clothing also we can do

ablution with easily and we made

beautiful things and you know in

Pakistan those of you who have been to

Pakistan you're from Pakistan they have

enroll pindy this incredible museum

called Lok varsa and local varsa in

Punjabi means the tradition of the

people and I went to that museum the

woman who took me she was one of the

curators she said and I was this is a

question in my mind

and so she answered it without me asking

it and it's like she said this is a

museum designed to preserve the cultures

of this land not to destroy them because

many people say that you know being put

in a museum is likes a lot of janazah

you know it's this the end of your

culture so they said we don't want to do

that and then if you go there you know

and you look at all these cultures in

Pakistan

you know Punjabi you know Pashtuns you

know the Cyndi's they're all these

different cultures and they're all

beautiful and everyone is distinctive

everyone is distinctive and they're so

beautiful it's like beyond words oh good

look at look at what the Indonesians to

what the Malays do but this is the way

we were traditionally you know you go to

a rosales this beautiful retreat we have

in Spain and you have a tile which is to

me one of the most beautiful tiles in

the world

you know it's an Andalusian tile but

it's called the breath of the most

merciful

and the colors are soft you know and

then you have what is called in a

Contracting Square which looks like a

cross with points and you have expanding

square which looks like I guess an

octagon okay inside and that's that's

the breadth of the most merciful in and

out and you know so how did they develop

that and it's so simple but and

especially I do I'tikaf there in the

last ten days of you know Ramadan if I

can and you know I just like to focus on

those tiles because to me they're

spiritually therapeutic right so this is

who we were and this is who we are and

this is who we must be and you know

beauty is our means right beauty in

making beauty and you know again you

know one of our teachers who studied

metaphysics we talked tonight about my

booty and koona we and others these are

the greatest Mehta physicians they are

spectacular

you know this man spent his life

studying great mother physicians and

that's not something that everybody can

do not everybody can do rocket science

you know but this man he was visiting a

particular place in Pakistan I think

body Imam

or bullish ah I don't know which one it

was and he's overstayed his time so he

came out it was late at night and he had

to be taken to his hotel and his hotel

was a long ways away and there is nobody

there and then out of the darkness came

this cart a cart driver and those of you

who know or do you know what they call

that cart

I always forget and you know the cart

driver he said if you looked at him his

clothes you could buy all of them for

one dollar in the market he was a poor

man and so he spoke them he didn't know

or do he knew Persian he spoke to him in

Persian and said could you take me to

the hotel the man answered or do he

could understand it because the

languages are close he got on the front

seat of the car with this poor man and

the man who was he

this world is filled with amazing things

began to recite to him from Hafez and

Rumi in perfect Persian and he said in

those 45 minutes I learned more about

metaphysics than I learned in 30 years

so beauty is the language of truth also

and that's why you know even some of the

things we talked about tonight because

it put in an intellectual vocabulary

not everybody can understand that but

when you put that into poetry when you

put that into rhyme when you put that

into art and into beauty you know then

everybody gets it and beauty attracts

you then to those meanings this is why

also our societies were so beautiful and

you know a lot about that I remember

going to one of the great I think it's

the celli mia one of the great mass of

scene and in a DNA I think it is and

it's basically read and I actually

couldn't leave that mosque it's like

this is the story of the whole universe

you see it's a he's telling it in colors

he's telling in symbols he's telling

into shapes but like what have you done

here you see so this pulls our souls to

the truth and oddly Nastasia opposite

and that's why we want to replace the

ugly

with beauty thank you on that note I

want to thank you dr. omar on behalf of

the community here for coming this way

also Hodja Samara for coming and

supporting you may you have a blessed

trip here the Maurice Murray tenían say

that Abbas in Shaba may not see any evil

I want to thank everybody for coming out

tonight

may Allah subhana WA Ta'ala bless doctor

Omar Abdullah Farook and his family and

his loved ones and keep him safe and

preserve him Shalom may we benefit from

what we've heard tonight and may you all

return to your homes safe and sound and

and have a blessed sleep with some dream

time inshallah may you say may you see

beautiful things in your dreams

tonight's and shall one of the signs of

the end of time is many beautiful dreams

that are true you see because this is

one of the ways it God's merciful to you

that you live in a world where so many

people don't believe so he sent you

these incredible dreams so may you have

beautiful dreams sweet dreams alive

archaic own ceremony

you

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