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Why Islam? with Sh. Mohammad Elshinawy | DoubleTake S4 E2
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Three-in-ten American adults describe themselves as atheists, agnostics or “nothing in particular” when they are asked about their religious identity, according to a Pew Research report from December 2021. Proving God’s existence is important, but it’s not the end of the conversation.
What distinguishes the Islamic perspective on God from other religious traditions? How certain can we be that Islam is correct? What are people missing when they choose to follow other religions?
Join host Mohamad Zaoud as he discusses these questions and more with Sh. Mohammad Elshinawy, Associate Director of the Systematic Theology Department at Yaqeen.
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Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Assalamualaikum wa rahmatullah Picture this, a friend or a colleague knocks on your door saying, I do believe in a god, but I'm not convinced that Islam is the right religion. What's your answer? Better still, imagine that a person is a brother or a sister, an uncle or a niece, a born Muslim, but not necessarily convinced that Islam is the right path. In a world where 3 in 10 American adults describe themselves as atheists, agnostics or nothing in particular, according to a Pew research report in 2021, we should be ready to answer such a simple question. What makes Islam the right religion? Today, I put that question to Sheikh Mohammed Al-Shinawi on our latest episode of Double Take, a podcast by Yaqeen Institute about the questions and ideas around Islam and Muslims that give us pause. Remember to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you get your favorite podcast. If you like what you hear or you want to share some feedback with the team, you can do so directly using the link in the show notes. My guest, Sheikh Mohammed Al-Shinawi is the religious director at the Islamic Education Center of Pennsylvania, and he's the associate director of systematic theology department at Yaqeen Institute. He's a graduate of English literature from Brooklyn College. He studied at the College of Hadith at the Islamic University of Badena, and he's a graduate and instructor of Islamic studies at Mishka University. This is his record-setting fourth appearance as a guest of Double Take. Enjoy the episode. Sheikh Mohammed, salam alaikum and welcome back to Double Take. Wa alaikum salam, wa rahmatullah wa barakatuh. Sheikh Mohammed, we just recorded an episode running through the proofs of God's existence.
We see signs of a creator all around us and within ourselves. Everything we see is proof that there is a necessary being to bring us into existence. In today's conversation, I want you to assume that I do believe in a God, but I need you to prove to me that Islam is the right religion. So an easy one to start off with, Sheikh, how do I know that Islam is correct? Bismillah, alhamdulillah, wa salatu wasalamu ala rasoolillah wa ala aalihi wa sahbihi ajma'in. That's a very important question, one that I personally asked my mother at about 14 or 15 years old. I remember sitting outside the building and I actually mentioned this in the intro of the final prophet, Proofs for the Prophethood of Muhammad book, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, that Yaqeen recently published. I remember sitting outside the building and I was stuck because you know the entire society saying religions are all the same and they're all essentially equally disposable, right? And at the same time I lived in Borough Park, which is known as Brooklyn, New York's Tel Aviv. It's like 92-95% ultra-orthodox, ascetic Jews. And so society is so strongly saying there's no truth in religions. And then I live also in an immediate neighborhood that seems to be just as convinced of their religion as I am of my Islam, right? If not more. So I was stuck, so I asked my mother like, how do we know Islam is right? And fast forward 20 years, that's what the Prophethood research came from. It's the resource I wish I had at that age because she turned to me with her warm smile and she was very welcoming of the question. She just asked for more, like what do you mean? And I said, you know, like every parent is going to tell their child their religion is right. So what makes us any different? Like it's all just, you know, inherited
or blind faith or wishful thinking or it just can't, they can't all be right. And so she just told me that you're just going to have to believe. And that was exactly the answer I didn't want, especially at a, you know, as a 15 year old in postmodern times. And so long story short, I went on to try to learn for myself, do we have very good reasons, justifiable reasons to believe Islam is right or not? And if I could just borrow the table of contents from the Proofs of Prophethood book, we mentioned, for example, that the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam's character, his akhlaq, his personality traits, the code by which he lived, his virtue code of ethics. This by itself is actually proof that he was truly a prophet of God. And how so? Ibn Taymiyyah says that, he says, you should just look around at all the people that claim to speak on behalf of God. They're not comparable whatsoever. They're like on two extremes of the spectrum. They're either the most virtuous people of all time, right? And that's why God chose them to be his prophets and messengers to speak on his behalf and relay his guidance to the world. Or they are the most conniving, manipulative, right, people ever. And that's why they used God's name for self-promotion. He said that since they're completely different archetypes or personality types, all you need to do is get to know a prophet's or a claimant to prophethood's character and there'll be no more room for confusion. They're either one or the other. There's no blurry middle. So if I'm understanding you correctly, you're saying to prove that Islam is the right religion, we simply need to prove that the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam was a prophet. Is that correct? Is that the argument? Correct, because he is the most recent and the only traceable, you know,
you know, messenger of God, authentic messenger of God. And so if we establish his prophethood, we establish that Islam is true. But also we establish that all the other prophets were true as well, you know, secondarily, because he came to reaffirm the true religion of God and not to abolish it. I do want to go in depth about this, the prophethood argument, because I think you've spent a lot of time focusing on that in your research. Are there other proofs just before we get into the prophethood argument? I'd like to hear kind of the spectrum of if someone asked me the question, how do I know that Islam is correct? Am I limited per se to the prophethood argument? Well, I mean, of course, there is the Quran that the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam brought. And so it's really inseparable from the prophethood. There are the inherent teachings of Islam. So you think of like Islam as a message in terms of its moral and intellectual greatness. This is also proof of the truth of Islam. And there's so many angles to cut it, like the inherent purity and beauty and balance and sophistication of Islam is a testament as, you know, it is actually one of the most common reasons why Islam is being embraced far and wide all over the globe. When Pew Research Center asked people why, you know, Islam is such a rapid growth, why did you become, why did you become, why did you become Muslim? The number one and number two answers is that the message just makes sense. And the other one was the Quran that I got to engage the text myself. I read the text firsthand. And so what they find in that text, a pure, potent view of God, not a blurry image of God, not an unnatural belief in God, not a distant God who created and like walked away, as they say, in the deistic paradigm. So we have the
Prophet's character, peace and blessings be upon him. We have the Quran he brought, you know, how it propelled civilizations and transformed human beings and societies, the historical accuracy and the lost knowledge it mentions, its linguistic mastery, the widespread appeal. What other book on the planet is really, you know, memorized by people, not even close, let alone tens of millions of people all over the world. So we have the Prophet's character, peace and blessings be upon him. We have the Quran, we have the purity and inherent beauty and value of the message, let alone a message that can be so universal across different cultures and across, you know, history, throughout history. So you measure it horizontally and vertically, the message is so profound. That's three, right? Character, Quran, message. Then there are his accomplishments. Like only Islam, as brought by the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, had this extraordinary potency. Like who else besides the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him? What else besides, you know, the renewed, you know, iteration of Islam, the reintroduction of Islam to the world, in the life of the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, did away with alcoholism effectively from society? No one's ever done that. Classism, like class-based bigotry from society, no one's ever done that. And that's why, you know, the French historian, speaking of accomplishments, Alfonso de Lamartine, he says, like, when he speaks about Muhammad, peace be upon him, being the greatest human being ever, he said, take three factors, like the greatness of purpose and the tininess of resources and astounding results. If these are the three by which we measure human greatness, can we ever claim that anyone is as great as Muhammad? He says this, peace and blessings be upon him, like he didn't just come and overturn, for example, on the theological front, one faulty belief about God, or like respond to mistaken notions about God that are embedded in the society from one religious background. He said
he wrestled the world away from a thousand superstitions. How did he do that, peace and blessings be upon him? Then you go to, like, Arnold Toynbee, when he wrote in his book, Civilization on Trial, about the Prophet's accomplishments, he said, you know, the modern world is in dire need of a uniquely Islamic contribution to the world, which was its ability to do away with race consciousness. No one's ever done that before. And then, like, lastly, if I can quote one more, when William Draper, William Justin Draper, he said, you know, to be seen as fit to be a role model for one-third of the planet's inhabitants, one-third of the human race, think about that, like, everyone's got their preferences, everyone's got their cultural norms, and yet you're still accepted, the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam, as a fit for the model of human excellence. He said that just might qualify a person to be considered a messenger of God, or he said an apostle of God. And so you bring all that together, we got the character, we got the message, we got the Quran, we got truly unique accomplishments, you have his physical miracles that really can't be denied, because how does an entire generation of people witness this and collude on a lie? That's impossible. You can't all agree on a lie, you know, the playing telephone, you know, game, the word and the story changes. They all agree that he performed these miracles, salallahu alayhi wa sallam. And the last thing I'll say are his prophecies, the amount of times he spoke specifically and accurately about the future. This is like an endless ocean, this genre of a hadith where he foretold events from the future. You can say other people did as well, other people spoke in cryptic messages, right? And then after the fact you want to, like, you know, back project a reverse engineer and say that's what I meant, right? You speak in these, like, riddles. And they were eventually wrong, like, you think of the Mayans, you think of Nostradamus, you think of these false prophets here and there.
There's actually a really good book called Forbidden Prophecies that shows you the contrast of everyone that has ever dared speak about what only belongs to God, right? Which is the future. And they've all been exposed eventually, whereas the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, dozens and dozens and dozens of times he speaks with such accuracy, and yet he was never wrong, salallahu alayhi wa sallam. Everything would unfold exactly as he said, or some have yet to unfold, and they surely will follow the same pattern as their predecessors, the previous prophecies. So how many we got so far? There's like four or five if I'm not mistaken. So just to summarize, I want to see if I'm a good student. I mean, this is the fourth episode that I record with you, Sheikh, so please let me know if I'm improving in my understanding. Let's say someone knocks on my door and says that, I kind of believe that there is a God, but prove to me that Islam is the right religion. You're saying to me there are a few directions I can take that answer in. The crown jewel, if I'm not mistaken, is around the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, proving his prophethood, going through his prophecies that he mentioned, going through also his accomplishments. He accomplished quite a few things, the least being the equality and equity that he brought to society, the accomplishment of annihilating alcohol and drunkenness in society. We can also talk about the Quran and its miraculous nature. You can, of course, go in various directions there, such as the miraculous nature of the Quran itself, in terms of the scientific miracles, the linguistic miracles. What would you say,
because I do want to kind of go back to you mentioning that, well, if a third of humanity follows a man, something must be right. I want to get back to that point, but would you say that's an accurate summary of the proofs that Islam is true? Those four or five things that I mentioned, is there anything that you'd like to add to that? Yeah, so we said character is one, message is two, accomplishments is three, prophecies is four, physical miracles is five, and then the living miracle of the Quran, that's six. Those are the six I tried to capture in the book, yeah. Well, then I'm going to take you up on the Prophet ﷺ. You said that if a third of society of the world follows the Prophet ﷺ, something must be right. I could technically say the same thing about Isa, or you said you lived amongst a very strong Jewish community in New York. They could probably say the same thing about Musa ﷺ. So why can't I just use the same argument for another religion? Well, no, hold on. Judaism comprises of how many people in the world population? Not going on two billion people, or anywhere close to even a billion, right? Christianity, say. Okay, so let's go to Christianity. Actually, I won't speak. I'll leave the stage to Michael Hart. Michael Hart is a non-Muslim, American historian in contemporary times who wrote that famous book, The Hundred Greatest. And it was actually the hundred most influential people. And I think that there's a benefit in identifying that. He's not even talking about who he likes more or less. He's talking about impact. And that's your question. Impact, influence, how much change, how much of an effect and imprint did they leave on the world?
And he placed the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, number one. And he placed Isaac Newton, number two. And he placed Jesus Christ, the son of Mary, peace be upon him, number three. And he writes in his introduction, and you can even sense from the introduction of the book that he knows, he's preempting, he knows people are going to get upset at him for saying this. But he's like, I understand people may wonder, how can I put Muhammad in front of Jesus? Or how can I put Muhammad in front of so many of these people? He's saying, but at the end of the day, he's trying to have some academic integrity. He wants to be, you know, a historian that is that is honest and principled. He's saying at the end of the day, there was nobody else in all of human history that was truly successful on the religious and the secular levels at once. You think about that, like the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, brought a message of religious instruction and moral guidance, and sort of civil and political and foreign instruction as well in terms of like policy in terms of, you know, legal frameworks and otherwise. Jesus, peace be upon him, none of that is there. He was not as influential as the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam. Even according to the Christian narrative, Jesus, peace be upon him, was hung at the cross. He was slaughtered, if you will, according to their narrative. And that's why even, you know, Karen Armstrong, when she wrote in her book, Muhammad, the Prophet for our times, and she's also a non-Muslim historian, she says, you know, in an interview one time, not in the book actually, she says that, you know, Muhammad, peace be upon him, was a dazzling success story. She says that, you know, in an interview one time, not in the book actually, she says that, you know, Muhammad, peace be upon him, was a dazzling success story. She says, unlike Christianity that has at the center of its
narrative someone being killed at the hands of his enemies in a powerless way, the Prophet, Muhammad, peace be upon him, went from success to success to success, right? And that's in terms of the influence in the world. And you just look at it today, like Christianity, of course, it's just going from success to success, right? You know, we may not have experienced that but it's really these three things that are at the center of our personagem, right? You believe we have We're kind of No, it's not. And it's kind of the same with the way we think about it. Substantive affect. Of course, that is becoming more and more prevalent throughout the Islamic culture. Okay. And so I think the first thing that you would bring too, Or Didah is that, to throw shade here at Jesus Christ, peace be upon him. But consider how operative is the message of Christianity in the heads, in the minds, in the hearts of Christians today. Christianity today, how influential is it? Even if in numbers wise, you can have 2 billion adherents, Christianity has largely been reduced to a feeling, right? That's why when Jimmy Swaggart, the famous missionary and debater, he was debating with the Muslim debater from South Africa, Ahmed Didat, may Allah have mercy on his soul. He said to him, we have 2 billion people who love Jesus Christ. That's what the church has produced. He said, you have 2 billion people that profess the love of Jesus Christ, peace and blessings be upon him. But we have 1.5 billion people at the time or whatnot that live the love of Muhammad, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. That talking about your influence at the moment, right? How influential is he when we, even down to how exactly do we move our fingers in prayer? How to better align with the daily practice? How does he go to sleep? How does he wake up? How does he enter the bathroom, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam? How does he sit when he's eating? How does he exit from the restroom? How does he come off of his bed? What side does he sleep on?
How does he deal with his loved ones? How does he deal with his enemies? All of that, right? He's so much alive in his example, preserved and lived until today. Nobody comes close. There's just, in fact, and I always love to say this, the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam is not forget even being compared by those we may admire for like accomplishments on the secular front or on the worldly level, even compared with the greatest of the prophets and messengers, right? Like look at Abraham, peace be upon him, and Jesus, peace be upon him, and Moses, peace be upon him, and Noah, peace be upon him. Only the Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, was able to transform his people, right? And the inertia from his call continues to grow until today, right? And so there truly is no comparison. So can you summarize the Christian and the Jewish difference? What distinguishes us from the Christians and the Jews before we move on to the framework? Because I do like that there's a very, very clear framework before we get to the framework. If you believe that someone died for your sins, as is the common belief in Christianity by Christians regarding Jesus Christ, peace and blessings be upon him, then what exactly is my meaning here? What is my purpose here? I've done my deed in a statement that I have accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior, peace and blessings be upon him. But what purpose is left there? What incentivization is there for pursuing the highest ethical standards and living the best life I can, and not just waiting it out till the Kingdom of Heaven sort of arrives for me? And on the other side of this, what is my perception of a God who sort of left me here in limbo without purpose? Where is the wisdom there? Or if you were to consider Judaism, that traditionally at least speaking, they hold that the Israelites are God's chosen people. So if God
has already chosen his people, then what is the point for those people or the people that are locked out of that special elite class? And also once again, what is our perception of God and his justice if people are sort of doomed from the get and they have no fighting chance? As opposed to Islam where it tells you that every single human being has, theoretically speaking, the ability to climb to whatever ranks of righteousness, of piety they put in the effort towards and show the sincerity for. And in that sense, we see God's wisdom for why we're here and we see God's justice in the social mobility in the salvation sense, right? JazakAllah khair. So I hear you loud and clear that Islam provides a higher purpose. It provides clarity on the big existential questions and those things are more compelling than some of the other organized major religions. You mentioned something earlier about Islam providing you a framework. Is it enough that it provides you a framework to believe or does there need to be a framework for how to live your day-to-day life? Absolutely. So both. I mean in terms of belief, the harmony in the theology of Islam and even the amount of focus it has in belief in God and armoring yourself with confidence in his omnipotence, in his power. This is what Charles Taylor, who often speaks about the flatness of the secular age and he writes on this in great detail, he says that unique emphasis on God and belief in destiny exists in Islam in such an empowering way that doesn't exist in any other faith system, in any other religious tradition. So that's a framework of faith. Then there's also a framework for the devotional rituals, if you will, right? There are devotional rituals that are given
to us in Islam that also bring us to greater heights of our faith because faith is not just about knowledge, right? And information. It's about, you know, devoting ourselves so that we transform, transform even in our convictions. And so it keeps us conscious and keeps our consciousness of God alive so that it's a living force in our life. See, people believe in God. It's natural. It's inborn. Everyone believes in the abstract sense, you know, a supreme being, a supreme being, a higher power, right? But how to believe in him in a way that brings it to the fore, that makes it relevant, right? Enough to actually have an impact on our life. And Islam does that through, for example, salah. You know, I had in Ramadan, actually, we had a Syrian Christian brother who attended our iftar for neighbors. And after we broke our fast, we went to pray Maghrib, then we came back for the meal. And each of us sat with one of our neighbors one-on-one to actually address their questions. And so I sat with him and he said to me that there is a community member here in your mosque that every time I find myself in a dark place in my life, like I really swerve from where I want to be, I guess he was insinuating the party life or whatnot. He says, I find myself asking the big questions again, like, wait a minute, how did I get here? Where did I come from? Where am I going? This can't be it. He says, so every time in a dark place, I talk with this co-worker of mine who attends your mosque, and the conversation always winds up about Islam. But in regards to devotional framework, he said, and watching you guys pray just now, we just prayed the Maghrib prayer, the sunset prayer. He said, I realized that if I had five appointments a day to reset, to circle back, to renew my cognizance of God, I would probably
never find myself in that dark place anymore. So that is part of the framework, the devotional framework that feeds our faith day in and day out so that it can be a force in our life. Another part of the framework that comes to mind very quickly is the legal framework. And the word law in post-Marxist times is correlated with like heavy and tyranny and all that stuff. But in terms of sparing us playing trial and error with the world, sparing us of underestimating the slippery slopes, definitive guidance, detailed guidance, everyone can want to be a good person, you know, when it means no rape, no killing, no stealing. But how does that play out? You know, everyone knows that alcohol is poison, like wine is poison. But is there such a thing as drinking responsibly? How about like having a designated driver, at least amongst us? How about, you know, we all play this game, despite the tens of millions of people the World Health Organization says die every year from this stuff. And there's more. But one brother, actually one of the most recent brothers to take shahada in our masjid, he had taken a Quran from me at one Friday. And then two Fridays later, I saw him sitting in the crowd. And so I approached him after the salah, after the sermon. And I said to him, what's going on? Are you Muslim yet? Like in light spirits, because he sat through his second khutba and he took a Quran and whatnot. So he stood up, he said, No, not yet. I said, So what's stopping you? He said, You know, Islam is strict, right? That's the legal framework. Islam is strict. So I took like a deep breath, like just rounding up all my answers of why it's not that strict. But before I could exhale, he said, and that's what I love about it. I was like, what? He said, Only Islam offers me the type of discipline
that I need in my life. I was like, What do you mean? He said, My father ruined our family due to being an alcoholic for the past 20 years. And I realized that only Islam's zero tolerance policy on alcohol, right? The hadith says if Allah will intoxicate, even a little is haram. The hadith says, you know, don't sit at the same table if alcohol is being circulated, right? Don't come near it. We underestimate the magnetic pull of these things sometimes. He said, And so only Islam's zero tolerance policy gives me some reassurance that I will not do that to my family when I have one one day. And alhamdulillah, he took a shahada a few minutes later. MashaAllah. I mean, I have a question on behalf of that guy, say 10 years ago, or your Syrian Christian friend, you're saying Islam is the right religion and that Allah is real and true and the Quran is perfect. And the Prophet's character, you know, is perfect. Why not make everyone? Why didn't Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala make everyone Muslim then? Like, couldn't it? Wouldn't that have been just a lot easier? Wouldn't we have been swimming in the same direction? Everyone would be, you know, I guess, following this moral conduct and framework that you mentioned. Sorry to ask the question, but let's just say I'm asking for a friend. I love it. I love it. So, you know, this was this was the question of the angels, wasn't it? Like the Quran tells us that when Allah said, I'm placing humans on earth, they said, we don't get it. Of course, they weren't objecting, but they wanted to understand. Like, you're going to place there someone who's going to wreak havoc on earth and spread corruption on earth and shed blood on earth. We don't get it.
We celebrate your praises. We glorify your name. Like, why not make everybody like us? That's exactly your question. And so Allah Azza wa Jal said to them, inni a'lamu ma la ta'lamoon. I know what you don't know. And so he didn't answer the question, then and there at least. And so that's first of all, to have the intellectual humility that the angels had, that some things we may not even be able to understand the answer for, even if it were given to us. Right? Some things we will only know the answers for the day we meet Allah. That's number one. Number two, of what the scholars mentioned here is that when Allah said, I know what you don't know, I know that among humanity will arise the prophets and the pious, the people that in an ocean of darkness will radiate with their light, will reflect God's light on earth, and so on and so forth. And that is the hero story. And that's what makes it, and I'm not trying to romanticize this, but it really is that gorgeous. It's that brilliant that you find also in the Quran, in Surat Ar-Ra'd, Allah says that when these, this class of people who goes against the tide, and you know, lives out that hero story, they arrive in paradise. Allah says the angels, the ones who asked the question, right? The angels will enter upon them from every door. It's like a celebrity and everyone's fanning all over them. They will enter upon them in Kulli Baab, from every door, saying what? Salamun alaykum bima sabartum. Peace be upon you. Eternal peace for having been so perseverant, having been so patient. And so this world was not intended as a utopia. It was intended so that individuals in this world will be celebrated for their patience. By the way, the angels, despite being sinless, are admiring human beings and were all sinful for their patience. Because although angels are sinless,
they never exuded or exhibited patience. Nothing was a temptation for them. Nothing was a struggle. And so the struggle and the scraping and the imperfections and the mistakes en route, and still arriving at that station, is part of the grand wisdom here. And if a person can't understand all of that, why the angels admire you because you had patience and they didn't, and so you're really impressive to them, then at least, you know, recognize why Allah said, I know what you don't know. And also recognize, finally, and I'll close with this, that a wise person will preoccupy themselves more with, you know, what I do understand, which is my purpose on earth, not what I don't understand, which is why is this the purpose of the cosmos, the purpose of the creation of the earth and the heavens? It's like someone saying, why do we have an exam today? This world is an examination room. Teacher says, because I decided there's going to be an exam. But I didn't agree to the exam. But you have 15 minutes. No, I object. Well, now you have 14 minutes. I don't care. Well, now you have 13 minutes. The wise person will just put his head down and say, let me, you know, crush this exam. May Allah help us all, you know, excel in our exams in this world. I mean, one final question, Shaykh, before we move to the rapid fire. Help my nine-year-old niece crush her exam, please. You know, she's been nine years old for like two years now. I've got 32 nephews and nieces. One of them is bound to be nine. So yeah, I mean, that one, that one graduated. She's in, she's, she's 12. So she comes to you and she says, why should I believe in Islam? Very simple, very simple question. What is your response to that nine-year-old? I know it is a bit cliche, but I would tell her
it is absolutely true that we were created to love. Because Allah told us we were created for Ibadah. And there are 60 words for love in Arabic, different levels of love. And the highest of them is the word Ibadah. And so you were created for love, for loving Allah, Subhanahu wa ta'ala. And everything that we do, submitting to Allah, everything we submit in, are expressions of our love and our longing for Him. That is our purpose. And that's the only thing that will never disappoint us in life. Sheikh, Jazakallah khair. It won't be a rapid fire, it won't be an episode with with Sheikh Mohammed without a fiery rapid fire session. So I'm going to get straight into it with an easy one. What's the latest book that you were reading? Latest book I'm reading is Strange New World by Carl Truman. Okay, if you were given an unlimited supply of one book and it's not the Quran and you were to give it to others, which book would it be? Hadith books or not Quran? Any book, any book other than the Quran. I mean, of course, you let's say hadith because you put me in that trap and then a non-hadith book as well. If it's a non-hadith book after the Quran in our day and age, this is going to sound very conceited but the Proofs of Prophethood book that I helped put together for Yaqeen. Jazakallah khair. You know, if it was my choice, I would choose When the Stars Prostrated. It's your other book. Jazakallah khair. Imagine a friend is visiting New York City
and they want you as their tour guide. Name three destinations they have to visit. Oh man, you're exposing me here. You can say the Seinfeld Cafe, it's up to you. I escaped New York City because I hate the place. It's the place I hate containing the people I love. Oh man, it would probably just be some, you know, some sites regarding the Islam's history in New York City, to be honest. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Some of the sites regarding the Islam's history in New York City, to be honest. Some of the older masajid in New York City. Yeah, we have parks. I'm not going to take him to Times Square. That would require a ta'aba. Sheikh, the James Webb telescope came out just recently and some photos were released. What was your reaction to some of these photos? Of course, utter awe like everyone else. Extremely humbling. I think one of the reflections I had deeply is that no matter how many evidences we come across, how many signs of Allah Azza wa Jal we find in the universe, if you're not looking for truth, they'll never be enough. And if you are looking for signs for Allah Azza wa Jal, one of them would be enough. Just, you know, witnessing the very contrary reactions, right? It increased some people in awe of Allah and others further
further disdainful pride in science being the by all end all. And Alhamdulillah for not being that blindfolded. That all we see is a few more miles and a few more molecules and we don't see what has to be behind it all. If there was one book that you would recommend, we'd give a non-Muslim neighbor who is asking questions about Islam, of course, the Quran. Would you recommend any other book to go alongside that? No, I wouldn't. I used to work for an organization called freequran.org and I was truly disproven in my theory that Quran in translation doesn't relay much. I used to believe that and I just saw, you know, an endless torrent of people coming my way having become Muslim because of just reading the basic in translation ballpark messages of the Quran. So I wouldn't crowd the Quran with anything. JazakAllah khair. Sheikh Mohammed, I would love for you to to join us nearly every week on Double Take. Your conversations are always very inspiring and I love the way that you're very clear and concise in your answers. So I appreciate you taking time again to join us on Double Take. BarakAllahu fik. Fikum Barak Sayyidina.
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