<DUA>
First of all, it's it's a very bizarre experience that I think a lot of us are having here in the United States of late. I think the social disintegration that's happening so rapidly and as things begin to unravel. Even a lot of people that I know: Immigrants are talking about, maybe going back to places they came from. Which don't look that appetizing either. Now in a lot of areas but one of the things about Muslim countries even when things break down, people really do recognize the word brother and sister. Like that word actually means something in many many places around the world.
I've experienced the beauty of that word, not so much as its articulated, but the real lived experience of somebody treating you like a brother or like a sister. You know, I was thinking a lot about United against poverty I actually think it would be better if we were united against wealth. Because I've actually lived in the poorest countries in the world, I mean literally the porest.
I was in Nigeria, Mali, I was in Mauritania. I lived in a place in Mauritania where the rich people had all of their possessions in one box and the poor people didn't have a box. I mean really and my own teacher Mrabit al Hajj, may Allah preserve him, he was actually considered relatively wealthy because he had a few cows that were milked every day and that's where they drank their milk. The milk in ??? is organic milk, it's not pasteurized homogenized it's not 1% or zero fat. It's right out of the utter.
What I noted about living in the poorest places and I lived in a shantytown, I mean a complete open sewage; The houses were made out of Chinese tea boxes literally that were dissembled from tea boxes and that's how they made their houses.
I lived with a man at al-Maquri from the Masuman Clan. His little Hut was made out of tea cartons and these were some of the richest people I have ever known. They were rich in community, they were rich in culture. There were people that could quote the greatest Arabic poetry ever written.. Most of them memorized the Quran by heart and for entertainment they would discuss grammatical points. These were really rich people they were not impoverished unless you want to identify poverty as material poverty and I'm not really against material poverty but I'm very much against cultural and spiritual poverty because I think what's happening in this country is we are the most
culturally and spiritually impoverished nation in the world. The fact that the number one best-selling novel right now is a pornographic novel of no literary merit (Editor: 50 Shades og Gret) according to the critics that have read it but this is what's happening in America. Every airport I've been to has a whole row of these novels just lined up for people just to devour them off the shelves. That is poverty
it's poverty not to of if you're from
this culture it's poverty not to have
ever read Melville so that when some of
my Chris Hedges can tell you about the
Pequod or a Habs quest you don't have
any cultural references to know what
that means despite the fact that even
the poorest Americans a hundred years
ago had very often read that book
because literature is not the property
of the wealthy historically literature
as has actually been the property of the
most impoverished people some of the
greatest writers were impoverished
people read the life of Edgar Allan Poe
somebody constantly in debt a drug
addict
dealing with the despair of living in
the United States at that time and a lot
of his literature is about that those
aspects Dostoevsky read about their
lives and yet they produce this great
body of literature because they were not
culturally impoverished they may have
been materially impoverished but they
were not culturally impoverished one of
the most celebrated authors one of the
most celebrated artists in Western true
mission is Van Gogh and he was a
completely impoverished person supported
by his brother never sold a painting
during his own life time another very
tortured person but somebody who had a
richness of vision that people are still
entranced by his paintings so I think
that a lot of what's happening in this
country is actually from Liguria it's
actually from luxurious to be one of the
seven deadly sins
that's the Latin term for for lust
Luxuria you know gluttony and lust that
we're a surfeited culture we're we're
too full there's too much when people
talk about the 99 and the 1% we're 5
percent of the world's population and
we're devouring most of the world's
natural resources the average American
is in the 5 percent the other part of
the world is the other 95 percent so
when we're talking about the 1 percent
and the 99 percent some of the people in
that 1% are drug dealers in inner cities
really so the whole dichotomy zation is
this desire to kind of split the world
into good people and evil people to me
as a false dialectic that I think as
Muslims we should reject we should
reject it there are wretched demonic
people amongst the poor and there are
decent angelic people amongst the
wealthy and the Prophet Allah Saddam had
poor people with him and he had wealthy
people and without the wealthy people he
could not have done what he did for the
poor people but he transformed the
motives of the wealthy he transformed
their motives he didn't create a class
warfare he didn't make the poor people
hate the wealthy people are the wealthy
people feel contempt for the poor people
no he gave us a different criterion to
judge people we were talking earlier
today about
intellectual arrogance because you see
so many people in academia that are
filled with intellectual arrogance a
sense of their inherent superiority
because if you learn even a little bit
you quickly see how far ahead you are
from a lot of people out there and that
can lead to a type of contempt because
you have some kind of intellectual
training that other people do because
you can work things out quicker than
other people can work out because you
know these references and other people
don't know these references but the
reality of it is is that Islam put a
different criterion for excellence than
intellectual excellence it's spiritual
excellence it's being a human being and
that is open to the poorest of the poor
and the richest of the rich and that's
what separates people so that street
sweeper that janitor might have more
humanity ounce per ounce than that PhD
professor at Yale University
he might have better character more
moral integrity he might be a better
father a better Civic member of society
because the real judge of people in
Islam is a judge of character it's not
anything else the prophets iliza time
standard was a standard of character and
he said in fact the standard of that
standard was how you treat your women
because he said that a man is judged by
how he treats his women cradle come
herecome Leah honey he wanna Hadouken
really the best of you are the best to
their women folk or their families and
I'm the best of you to my women folk so
he was letting us know right there what
the standard of judgment how you judge a
person because you've got all these
people out there giving all of their
declarations and proclamations and
telling you what's right and what's
wrong and they go home and they treat
their wife like dirt they treat their
children as if their subjects of Pharaoh
so the whole stratification if you're
talking about good and evil give me a
break
because it's all the way down this whole
crises this globe this global crises
that started here in this country was
about greed it was greed on Main Street
and greed on Wall Street all those
people that went in and lied on their
applications about how much they were
making because they wanted to get that
house for what they didn't even
understand what what type of mortgage
they were getting they didn't know that
it was going to balloon in a few years
they didn't care they just saw an
opportunity to get some property and
maybe it'll it'll rise in price and in a
few years I'll flip it pay off my debt
and make some money it was greed greed
on Main Street and greed on Wall Street
and that's why Islam doesn't talk about
the wealthy and the poor it talks about
character it talks about the moral
character of people and how you
transform people you know I was asked to
talk just about the Islamic economic
system in relation to the Western
economic system or this modern system of
capitalism you can't even compare the
two there's no comparison our system is
based on real well a bi-metal economy in
which money actually has intrinsic value
people say gold doesn't have intrinsic
value then why do people kill for it and
the only reason they kill for paper
dollars that don't have intrinsic value
is because they think that it has
intrinsic value but all you have to do
is put a fire to it you'll see how
valuable it is you put fire to gold and
you'll see how valuable it is because
gold is indestructible gold doesn't
corrode silver doesn't corrode they
don't oxidize the gold coins that were
minted by Caesar you can go down to a
store you're probably here in Stanford
and buy one of them if you have enough
money because it's still around this
whole Dajjal exsist 'm fooling people
into thinking that worthless paper has
any intrinsic value fractional reserve
banking Abraham Lincoln when he needed
to fund the war
he wanted to borrow money so he asked
the bankers and they told him well it's
going to be on this interest rate so he
said to hell with it
in the Constitution we can print money
so he printed up greenbacks
that's how he paid for the war they were
non interest greenbacks that were
printed by the US government
then why today are we borrowing money
from a private bank and paying them
interest and the interest now represents
25% of the national debt because the
bankers run the situation they wrote the
laws they wrote the laws and people
don't know this because they're no
longer educated and if you want to know
why it's getting so bad out there it's a
very plain and simple because we have
ignorant people we have an ignorant
population and when you have ignorant
populations then you need more and more
draconian measures for social control
and this is the history of the world you
just read about it in your history books
and you'll see the same tactics are used
to control ignorant people educated
people are the dangerous ones it's not
ignorant people you can control ignorant
people seriously they're not hard to
control bread and circus is one way
that's it that's the old-fashioned way
now it's at MTV and McDonald's that's
just a modern version of Penn at Circus
that's what the Romans used but it's the
same game you look at what they're
devouring on there look at look at the
cultural impoverishment of this society
you know people aren't hungry in this
society they're starving to death
they're starving to death and they're
starving to death even though they're
overeating the reason that they have to
eat more and more is because there's no
nutrients in the food so you're
wondering why they're all getting bigger
and bigger out there because the more
they eat the hungrier they feel they're
not satiated all you have to do come to
California and we'll give them a real
meal like brown rice and tofu and you'll
see how quick they're hungry they're
really they won't be hung
if you eat a real meal you go and eat
the Indians eat dal you don't see fat
Indians down in those villages because
they eat doll they eat real food
they're eating real bread that they
cooked with their own hands chapatis
they're eating chapatis and they're
eating dal and and they're there they
have better nutrition than all these
people out here they have better
nutrition but when you go up into that
1% you know what they're eating they're
eating dal and handmade chapatis really
they're eating the same stuff the
poorest people are eating in in a lot of
these countries go to Malaysia and you
see how poor people eat they're eating
real vegetables that they grew
Pakistanis in this country I know a lot
of you know this your grandmother's when
they got here the first thing they did
was went in the backyard and started a
garden they grow their own tomatoes to
put in their curries because that's just
the way they did it in this country used
to have what we called Victory Gardens
in World War two they told people to
grow your own gardens now people don't
even know what a vegetable is the
closest thing they get to it is a french
fries really or pizza it's because it's
got some red under there I think that's
from a vegetable serious they don't know
what vegetables are most kids now in the
schools can't identify a lot of the
vegetables they can't they've actually
done these tests then they don't know
what a turnip is or a Brussels sprout
let alone a collard green see some
people are old enough to know collard
greens right because people went out and
picked them because they couldn't afford
to go down to the store people were
resourceful this country was a country
of resourceful people there's all these
people looking for jobs people used to
make jobs they didn't look for jobs they
made jobs now people have been so dumbed
down and so convinced that they can't do
anything that only if they get this job
and then they go in is all humiliation
even Halden said the two most
humiliating ways of gaining a livelihood
are employment and treasure hunting
that's what he said
in Mankato employment and treasure
hunting in this country employment was
only just to learn how to do something
you became like a journeyman carpenter
and then when you finished the seven
years you were free to open your own
business that's the way it worked
you started a store to you you worked in
a store to see how it ran and then you
went and opened your own shop that's
what people did my great-grandfather
started at the bottom in a newspaper but
by his 50s he owned three newspapers
because that's the way America was it
was about entrepreneurial tradition of
people elevating people not everybody
was in that that's acknowledged but even
if you look in the black communities in
the south you look what they did
creating their own schools lawyers came
out of those schools some of the best
schools now today are still out of those
schools you look at people like Dubois
look at the level of education that they
had you know read what his books are
considered classics today so there were
people even from the most oppressed
communities that still rose above those
circumstances and empowered other people
to do the same the Islamic economic
system is based on justice now justice
even if you read Aristotle 2,500 years
ago almost if you read his book he has a
book number five in his ethics book on
justice and he talks about recta fitori
justice and distributive justice the
idea that you have to have some justice
in distribution you know what these
people say in this cut redistribution of
wealth that's socialism that's communism
that's socialism and communism when it
goes to the poor people but when it goes
to the rich people it's called a bailout
that's just
distribution of wealth it's just going
the other way and this is the type of
Orwellian culture that we are in but
people haven't read Orwell so how do
they know if you if you don't know
Orwell you're not going to know how to
use the adjective Orwellian and if
somebody uses it you don't know what
they're talking about
Orwellian is that like Orson Welles you
know if they know Orson Welles because
even good films they don't know about
any more like Citizen Kane right Siri
then people don't know that now they
know about like dumb and dumber you know
seriously I mean I saw a really you know
interesting statement about you know
just the popular culture and how they
take you know how they dress humiliate
these young black artists by getting
black males to wear female clothes you
know there was an interview with Oprah
Winfrey that Dave Chappelle had and he
said one day he went into the his his
dressing room they had a dress on the
chair and the the writer came in and
said Dave we've got a great part for you
we want you to put on this dress you're
gonna be a prostitute ha ha in that
funny days he said I'm not you know I'm
not cool with that because he's I mean
in the end whatever you say about Dave
Chappelle he's all Muslim you know
there's I mean he's got limits right of
where he's gonna go and he said I'm not
putting on a dress and I'll come on all
the greats have done and he said well
then is hackneyed why should I do it if
all the greats have done it and then in
this clip they showed all of these films
where they had these really strong black
men dressed in dresses
you know humiliating them what is that
about why does how you would have to
humiliate people what is that about all
of these people that they they really
squelch down they
end up drug addicts and and meltdowns
you know they kill themselves really
having all these melded what is that
what kind of culture is that that that's
what they do to their most creative
people drive them to drug addiction and
to public meltdowns what that's
impoverishment these are poor people and
if you don't have compassion for poor
people you don't have any compassion but
I'm saying they're all impoverished
really the richest people to the poorest
of the poor they are impoverished
because they're culturally and
spiritually impoverished and that is the
poverty that we should be united against
but if the Muslims are going to
participate in it if we're going to
degrade our religion and turn our art
forms into pale imitations of their art
forms if that's what we have to offer we
don't have the richness of tradition
looking back into the past what did they
do what did they do that can inspire us
today to do it in our own way but we're
people of legacy we believe in legacy we
believe in things handed down and you
hand down things of worth you don't hand
down junk the prophets all the light is
sin and one of the things about him that
amazes me and everything about him
amazes me but one of the things that
I've contemplated is the fact that he
named his personal belongings and what I
realized about that in my estimation
while out on Adam is that he was
honoring goods that enhance our lives he
had a name for his comb he had is a name
for his turban he only had a handful of
things in his life if you actually took
all of the possessions that he had they
would fit into a very small box but he
named them because they were meaningful
things to him we live in a society that
gives stuff no meaning
it's not only nameless it's discarded as
fast as people buy it we have engineered
obsolescence things aren't built to last
if you want a idea because I'll be your
first customer
I have a idea like I want a shop called
till death do us part things for people
that want things that last because when
I was a kid if you bought something it
lasted I do brush leaves because my
grandfather had a cattle ranch um and we
had to go up and he would always put us
to work because he was old school and
that's what he thought you should do to
kids because because they put him to
work when he was six years old he was
selling bubble gum on Market Street in
San Francisco California in 1899 so that
was what he would do so we'd be just
pushing brooms and there'd always be a
tree at the end we could go ride a horse
or something but the brooms that I was
pushing when I was five years old they
were the same brooms I was pushing when
I was fifteen because they were built to
last
now you go and you buy a broom and you
do you sweep your your sidewalk three
times and it's broken and then they tell
you well it's cheaper to just buy a new
one that's what they tell you now it's
just cheaper to buy new and we have to
reject this whole culture of consumption
we have to reject it the Islamic
tradition most of the if you look now
the wealth in this country 40% of the
wealth is not an economy of goods and
services that is the old American
economy it was an economy of goods and
services you produce things you sold
things or you did things for people like
you hired a carpenter and he would do
something for you or your mechanic so
goods and services that was that now
it's financial instruments it's making
money off of money this is the economy
of America and it's an economy that
takes wealth away from the middle people
and increasingly to the upper echelon
there's a Wall Street Journal op-ed
writer who's been covering the
wealthiest people he wrote a book called
richest an richest and like Pakistan but
it's where rich people live there's some
rich people in Pakistan trust me because
if you want to talk about wealth moving
up right but he wrote a book called
richest an and what he shows in that
book he had lower richest and middle
richest an and upper richest an and then
in Upper richest an he had a pound
called billionaire Vil a population of
one thousand two hundred and thirty
people those are the people that are
billionaires they have half of the
wealth of three billion people on the
planet half eight trillion people eight
trillion dollars half of that goes to
one thousand two hundred and thirty
people and the other half goes to three
billion people you think about that the
inequity that exists today on this
planet and we're part of it and I'm
going to just tell you a few things and
I'll close out with this tell you a few
things one historically the Muslims had
something in that you know when a
merchant comes into town you don't have
to ask where they got their goods from
this is what the I had taught you
know that there's butter on Asli and if
it's if it's a halal thing to purchase
you don't that tesu lettuce arrow
inertia and took that I've come to
succumb don't ask about things if you
find out it's you know so if somebody
comes in he's a merchant you don't ask
where he got it you can buy it if it's
how loud that that's traditionally how
they viewed it in I think in in
societies where most wealth acquisition
was relatively just that's fine I
personally don't agree with that opinion
today for things that we know about and
that we're able to do something about
and the single most important thing I
think to deal with the impoverished
conditions that we're living in this
country is to begin to empower people to
take back their communities
we have to make our own clothes
stop buying clothes that were made in
sweatshops we have to really this is
what we have to do we have to
re-establish family as the central most
important unit of a society because
Islam is about preservation of family
it's one of the six fundamentals
preservation of family if you look now
in the inner cities at the
disintegration of the family because if
you take oh if you take the father out
of fatherhood if you take the father out
of motherhood if you take the father the
brother out of brotherhood and the
sister out of sisterhood what do you
have left you have that the hood that's
all you've got left that's it and people
cannot survive in those conditions they
will die Camden New Jersey Chris Hedges
wrote a whole section on his book the
Empire of illusion about about that town
they they're going to dismantle the
police force in Camden they it's they
don't have money so they're just going
to regionalize it highest crime rate in
America just leave the poor people there
there's children on the streets doesn't
matter because these are throwaway
people what has to happen and the
Muslims and I'm going to chastise here
the immigrant community I really believe
that the immigrant community made an
ethical mistake as well as the strategic
mistake in not seriously taking the
existing indigenous Muslim communities
that you find in the inner cities to
heart and recognizing that they had a
moral obligation
to help them build community centers to
help them build their mosques it is a
disgrace when Suraj WA Haj Imam Surratt
when all over this country building
mosques for the entire Muslim community
mostly immigrant community and and and
he couldn't find the money to build a
beautiful Center in Brooklyn that's a
disgrace to this community because as
far as I'm concerned the single most
important community for the Muslims in
the United States of America is in the
inner cities it is the single most
important and I'm not saying this
gratuitously I'm saying this from my
heart it's the opinion of dr. Hadid
Blankenship who I consider one of the
most brilliant Muslim scholars that we
have not just in the United States but
on the globe and he has said that to me
many times so we have to be real about
helping these communities we want to get
the best and the brightest give them
scholarships so that they can give back
we don't want the migration up right
this is what happened with the the black
middle class and upper middle class they
just moved up and they didn't pick
anybody else up with them and now
they're completely alienating you have
completely separate african-american
communities in the United States that
can't relate to each other right and the
situation is so bad in places like East
Oakland really it's so bad and it's
right next door it's right next door
we're seeing social disintegration and
we have a moral responsibility as a
Muslim community we have a moral
responsibility to serve the unders
understand lisent promised us that you
are given victory by the weakest amongst
you and he meant what I thought he meant
like poor people that's who he was
talking about and he lived amongst them
and a lot commanded him to be patient
with the poorest of people who call on
their Lord in the morning
in the evening be patient with them be
with them don't hang out with the rich
people hang out with the poor people
that's what he told them Allah told him
to be with those to elevate them lift
them up bring them up
we need to dignify poverty in this
country because poverty in this country
is a blemish it's like something's wrong
with you you're like a a moral leper is
God's God is this is Protestantism at
its worst this idea somehow that God's
grace is when you get lots of money
Matthew 19 21 quoting crisp Christian
scripture here Matthew 19 20 19 21 when
the man comes to Jesus and Jesus says go
and sell your garment and give it to the
poor right go and sell your goods and
give it to the poor and you'll have a
treasure in heaven if you want to be
perfect go and sell your material
possessions and then give it to the poor
and then and then you can get a treasure
in heaven and you follow me the
Catholics took that very seriously and
that's why in the Catholic tradition the
highest thing is to renounce wealth
that's what monks do they have a vow of
chastity poverty and obedience chastity
poverty and obedience in those Catholic
schools they were all working for free
they were working for free the prophets
Eliza shows poverty over wealth he was
given a choice to be a slave prophet or
a king prophet and he chose to be a
slave prophet he lowered his standard of
living so that other standards could be
raised up that's a challenge that's a
moral challenge for people there's a
moral challenge wealth is a dangerous
thing
Satan no mater he said Satan Ali said
halala who he sab without on table
what's halau from well the permited is a
severe reckoning and what's Haram is a
chastisement and that's why the zoo had
they in all the books they say this the
people of zoo hood
the people that give up well cardona's
they're the most rational intelligent
people we have to lower our standards of
living really because we're living on a
planet right now that's in peril because
of all this wealth acquisition all this
greed because that's the fundamental
problem it's about bummer is just
wanting more when is enough enough you
know if you watch any program you watch
any of these animal shows you know those
animal program
I was once in West Africa with a
Egyptian American from New York and we
were in a jeep out in the middle of the
Sahara and he saw this all of these wild
animals he said man this is just like
the nature Channel
I said no the nature Channel is like
this yeah you got it wrong but if you
watch those programs when the lion gets
the zebra watch the other zebras you
watch them because they're all running
but right when that lion gets the zebra
they all stop and they go back to eating
because they know you know Harvey's gone
the lion got his lunch you know it's
over but the lion will not eat the whole
flock because the lion has a limit a
natural limit Aristotle said man is the
only one that has no natural limits in
Ellenson Alea tava our host Ivana
Shirley man goes to excess when he deems
himself wealthy when he deems himself
wealthy allies the wealthy and we are
the poor Sara Marku