Ali Dawah - November 04, 2014


Ali Dawah & Yusuf Estes || Why we chose islam?


Episode Stats


Length

15 minutes

Words per minute

181.71082

Word count

2,872

Sentence count

305

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Hate speech

21

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, we speak with Ali Dawah, a well-known figure in the UK's Dawah scene. Ali shares his story of how he came to Islam and his advice for those on the verge of accepting Islam.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 In the name of Allah, it's very lovely.
00:00:30.000 It's very lovely to be here in England, especially in this part in Blackburn.
00:00:33.820 And I really enjoy being with you.
00:00:35.960 I wanted to ask you, a lot of folks know who's Yusuf Estes.
00:00:40.060 Tell us who you are.
00:00:41.720 My name is Ali Dawah.
00:00:43.400 Ali.
00:00:44.080 Ali Dawah.
00:00:45.200 Dawah? 0.94
00:00:45.960 Yeah.
00:00:46.480 For real?
00:00:47.200 Not for real, not for real.
00:00:48.540 Ali's not natural. 1.00
00:00:49.860 You're not really here?
00:00:50.880 No, you feel like you're here.
00:00:53.300 Yeah, so basically my name is Ali Dawah.
00:00:55.620 It's my Dawah name.
00:00:56.920 I came to Islam in 2012, 23rd of December.
00:01:00.580 I've been involved in the Dawah scene for over a year now.
00:01:04.680 Is that right?
00:01:05.380 Yeah.
00:01:05.660 Do you have anything like on YouTube or anything?
00:01:08.120 Yes, I'm quite like known on the YouTube with the Dawah scene. 0.97
00:01:12.100 You're famous.
00:01:12.820 Can I have your autograph?
00:01:13.600 No, no.
00:01:13.940 Can I have a photo with you?
00:01:15.140 Oh, please.
00:01:16.140 No, go ahead.
00:01:16.700 No, as famous as you.
00:01:18.040 Go ahead.
00:01:18.580 But what I really want to touch up on is basically, I can remember back in the days, I spent about
00:01:23.880 three and a half years to four years looking into Islam.
00:01:26.760 And basically, I used to watch your videos.
00:01:28.700 Zakir Naik's videos.
00:01:29.540 Really?
00:01:30.000 Yes, your videos.
00:01:31.420 Zakir's cool.
00:01:32.120 Yeah, he's a cool guy.
00:01:33.080 You know, he's got a good memory.
00:01:34.440 I love it.
00:01:35.120 Yeah, mashallah.
00:01:36.240 And I really used to watch your videos.
00:01:38.200 And standing here today, I just wanted to like tell the viewers how, you know, sometimes
00:01:42.620 we neglect the power of Dawah. 0.99
00:01:44.420 And we say, you know what?
00:01:45.360 Is that really going to happen?
00:01:46.680 But subhanAllah, I'm standing here today with you.
00:01:48.620 And I used to watch your videos before I came into Islam.
00:01:51.840 Yeah.
00:01:52.020 So basically, it's just amazing to be here with you.
00:01:55.780 And obviously, I would really want your advice because I want to follow the footsteps of what
00:01:59.320 you do as a Dayi.
00:02:00.880 And it would be really good if you can kind of give me an advice.
00:02:02.760 And at the same time, to the viewers that are watching who are maybe on the verge of
00:02:06.700 accepting Islam.
00:02:08.000 And a couple of things that you can maybe touch upon as well.
00:02:10.700 Well, first and foremost, I think what I would tell you is, let's all follow the footsteps
00:02:14.740 of Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
00:02:16.200 Exactly.
00:02:16.680 And of course, that's implied from the beginning.
00:02:20.020 For the benefit of your viewers that come to your thing with, you know, with a bad image
00:02:26.140 of Islam or not the correct ideas, we'd like to just mention to them that everything
00:02:32.060 in Islam is always about what?
00:02:33.800 The biggest and foremost of all things, Tawhid al-Islam is what in English?
00:02:39.300 Yeah.
00:02:39.520 It's in the believing in the oneness of God Almighty and that he has no partners.
00:02:43.760 Yeah.
00:02:43.960 That's it.
00:02:44.580 Number one.
00:02:45.320 Exactly.
00:02:45.660 And we will take that from the Hadith of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
00:02:49.040 If I'm not mistaken, it's something like this that he told Muhammad ibn Jabal, I'm sending 1.00
00:02:53.540 you to the people of the book.
00:02:54.960 He was talking about Yemen.
00:02:55.740 And when you get there, teach them the oneness of God, the Tawhid al-Islam.
00:03:01.700 And then, if they accept that, teach them how to make connection, which would be Salah.
00:03:07.280 And if they accept that, then teach them about fasting, Salam Ramadan. 0.96
00:03:11.660 And go through everything, yeah, one by one.
00:03:14.400 Exactly.
00:03:14.620 So this is what we would do first and foremost before we talk about newcomers to Islam.
00:03:19.200 Let's be sure that they are understanding it is about oneness of God.
00:03:24.420 Exactly.
00:03:25.080 And I think most of your opposition comes from those who are either atheists or Christian.
00:03:31.120 Is that right?
00:03:31.580 Yes, that's right.
00:03:32.280 Mostly from Christian background and atheist backgrounds.
00:03:35.040 Okay.
00:03:35.620 And who do you see as being more amenable to your message, to take time to talk with you?
00:03:41.840 Well, to be honest, for the people that are really seeking the truth, they are the ones
00:03:45.540 that really come.
00:03:46.200 Like, for example, we was in Brazil about a couple of months ago to do Dawah and they 0.86
00:03:49.640 woke up.
00:03:50.580 And those kind of people, they did not know about Islam.
00:03:52.800 And they were very inclined to know.
00:03:54.160 And they would spend a great amount of time, like, really listening and, wow, we didn't
00:03:57.540 know this.
00:03:58.300 Like, you believe in one God, etc.
00:03:59.860 So these kind of people were the ones that would really be inclined to listen.
00:04:04.780 Alright.
00:04:05.560 So, those people there in Brazil are primarily, you've got people there that are Catholic.
00:04:12.300 Yes.
00:04:12.980 Yes.
00:04:13.180 The majority of them are Catholic.
00:04:14.580 Yeah, alright.
00:04:14.880 For the Catholics, we have something called, a website, it's called Bible Islam.
00:04:22.220 Okay.
00:04:22.660 BibleIslam.com.
00:04:23.980 Yeah.
00:04:24.340 And what we did there was to take pages and pages from the Catholic Church itself.
00:04:30.560 Yeah.
00:04:30.640 And then I put commentary with it to say, look at this.
00:04:33.600 This is what they did.
00:04:34.720 For instance, I'll give you one example.
00:04:36.560 Yeah.
00:04:36.700 During the same century that our prophet saw Islam was propagating Islam, which would be 1.00
00:04:42.540 the 600s, called the 7th century.
00:04:44.180 There was a council convened by the Catholic Church for the bishops and cardinals to decide whether
00:04:52.280 or not a woman had a soul. 0.68
00:04:55.880 Wow.
00:04:56.180 When was this?
00:04:57.200 What did I just tell you?
00:04:58.980 The same century as Islam came. 1.00
00:05:02.700 Here's these guys deciding whether or not a woman has the right to do anything because 1.00
00:05:07.520 she might not even have a soul.
00:05:08.520 Maybe she's a shaitan or a devil or... 1.00
00:05:10.500 Yeah.
00:05:11.080 Okay.
00:05:11.580 So, you didn't know that.
00:05:13.080 Yeah.
00:05:13.420 Another thing, when they talk about the age of Ayahu, when she married our prophet,
00:05:17.880 Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, the age of Mary, Mary, the mother of Jesus, peace be upon
00:05:23.280 him, to...
00:05:25.680 She has a baby, right?
00:05:27.360 But Joseph, which is known to be her husband, according to Christianity, is in his 90s, and
00:05:35.160 she's like 13.
00:05:36.220 I heard about that, yeah.
00:05:37.340 I heard about that, yeah.
00:05:38.460 This is, go to the website, and you'll find so many things, especially about the Council
00:05:43.260 of Nicaea, when they actually accepted a form of paganism that the rebels against them
00:05:50.000 in the 16th century, during the 1500s, those people protested against a lot of stuff.
00:05:56.020 That's why they're called Protestants. 0.93
00:05:58.060 Wow.
00:05:58.820 Okay.
00:05:59.360 So, you get all the feel of that, you're going, I didn't know that, I didn't know...
00:06:02.360 No.
00:06:02.820 And they're not going to stand there and tell you.
00:06:04.420 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:06:05.060 Because they know it'll make people start thinking about, well, what about this oneness
00:06:09.320 of God?
00:06:10.060 We come back to that.
00:06:11.240 Yeah, yeah.
00:06:11.640 Okay.
00:06:12.460 Look at the Crusades.
00:06:14.020 Look at the Inquisition.
00:06:15.260 First Crusades.
00:06:16.300 And who was it behind the Crusades, pushing so hard?
00:06:20.040 Well, these were people that were at the top of the Catholic Church and the Anglican Church
00:06:24.540 who didn't want people to hear.
00:06:27.700 There's really another religion out here teaching the same thing that our prophets taught,
00:06:33.000 only without the paganism.
00:06:35.720 Yeah, paganism.
00:06:36.140 Unitarians, right?
00:06:37.680 If I'm not...
00:06:38.540 I'm talking about Muslims.
00:06:39.660 Oh, the Muslims. 1.00
00:06:40.380 Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry.
00:06:41.140 Yes, they don't want people to know that there is something out here already, and it's
00:06:46.340 more in line with what you're reading in your Bible, and they'll be like, mm-mm-mm-mm-mm-mm-mm.
00:06:51.640 Especially when you can prove that their translations are not accurate, especially when they have
00:06:58.620 things that contradict it within the text.
00:07:01.300 And they'll just go vehement on you.
00:07:03.840 Oh, no way, but...
00:07:05.560 Yeah, yeah.
00:07:06.060 The facts are facts.
00:07:07.760 The older manuscripts don't have that.
00:07:10.060 Exactly.
00:07:10.340 Where did it come from?
00:07:11.400 That's a valid...
00:07:11.920 So that one website could help, but you have to let people read it on their own.
00:07:16.880 Definitely.
00:07:17.200 Don't stand over and tell them, you have to think like this, you have to think...
00:07:20.560 No, read for yourself.
00:07:22.140 If you don't like it, throw it away.
00:07:23.220 If you like it, okay, up to you.
00:07:24.780 There's no compulsion in religion.
00:07:26.540 Islam teaches us.
00:07:27.520 Yeah, of course there's no compulsion, but I'm saying that the style, methodology, or called
00:07:33.640 Menhaj, the way you approach somebody, you know, you gotta be fair.
00:07:38.800 Exactly.
00:07:39.440 And you're talking to somebody, an intelligent human being, who's been lied to, that's all.
00:07:43.480 Exactly.
00:07:43.940 But he don't want to hear that his mother lied to him, his father, his preacher, his teacher,
00:07:48.000 the people that I love and care about, how could they possibly lie?
00:07:51.420 Well, they've been lied to as well.
00:07:52.860 Exactly, that's very true.
00:07:53.580 And the link will be below to your website, which they can check out themselves.
00:07:56.880 Can I just ask you a quick question?
00:07:58.580 What was the main factor that kind of made you realize that, look, Islam is the truth. 0.73
00:08:04.560 Of your other faith that you had before.
00:08:06.340 In a quick summary, if you could summary up to us.
00:08:09.160 You know, oftentimes, oftentimes when people will ask me, what was it caused you to leave
00:08:16.140 Jesus, to leave Christianity, to go to some religion out here all about terrorism and 1.00
00:08:22.060 bombing and tell them, okay, hold on.
00:08:24.520 The two things you just said are the opposite.
00:08:27.060 As a Muslim, we are closer to the real Jesus, and we're closer to the way of Jesus, which
00:08:34.280 was to pray to God, and we pray to his God, that he told us to pray to.
00:08:39.760 You know, worship your God and my God, your Lord and my Lord.
00:08:43.920 That's not Islam saying that.
00:08:45.760 Well, we have it in the Quran, but that's coming right out of Christianity. 0.98
00:08:49.440 So, that's number one.
00:08:51.540 Number two, when you talk about Islam being about a religion of promoting aggression, it 1.00
00:08:56.840 clearly states in Islam that if you exceed, even forces coming against you, the evil coming 0.95
00:09:03.720 against you, you're only allowed to fight back equally.
00:09:07.020 But if you exceed it, then you're the aggressor.
00:09:09.080 Verily, Allah does not love the aggressor.
00:09:10.800 This is found in chapter two of the Quran, Surabakara.
00:09:14.620 It started at verse 189, because you get the feeling of the prophet answering some questions.
00:09:20.200 Then, verse 190, he's telling people about combat.
00:09:24.280 Verse 191, still on the same topic.
00:09:27.340 And then, in 193, people try to tell you, it says, force everybody to be a Muslim.
00:09:31.660 It doesn't say that.
00:09:33.120 Fight or be in combat until these people cease and allow you to practice your religion and 1.00
00:09:39.200 tell other people about it.
00:09:40.620 That's the understanding.
00:09:41.780 And not only that, if they stop fighting you, you're supposed to take them to a place of
00:09:45.520 security.
00:09:47.060 You don't have that in those verses.
00:09:48.900 In the Quran.
00:09:49.700 Not in those verses.
00:09:51.000 Oh, okay, okay.
00:09:51.500 But the understanding, yeah, of course.
00:09:54.440 Because we're not here about trying to take land away from people.
00:09:58.040 We're not here trying to take rights away from people.
00:10:00.400 What we're trying to do is make something clear so you can understand.
00:10:04.420 And then, if people are aggressive toward us, we're not allowed to fight them until it becomes
00:10:10.060 clear combat.
00:10:11.080 And then, we can only meet that combat.
00:10:12.840 That's what it says in the verses.
00:10:14.480 So, if you said, why did you leave Jesus?
00:10:16.440 We didn't.
00:10:16.940 We're trying to get closer to Jesus.
00:10:18.260 We followed the footsteps.
00:10:19.160 And why did you leave God?
00:10:20.340 We didn't.
00:10:20.740 We're trying to get closer to God.
00:10:21.920 And why did you turn your back on the Bible?
00:10:23.960 Well, first of all, the Bible you have isn't the original.
00:10:27.500 It's a translation.
00:10:29.340 And the Quran is original and it quotes the original Bible.
00:10:33.200 Because it only came from God, yes or no?
00:10:35.080 Yes.
00:10:35.260 So, if the Bible came from God, the Old Testament was from God, it says in the Old Testament 0.94
00:10:40.320 that they lost all of their scrolls during the Babylonian occupation.
00:10:45.800 So, what does that mean?
00:10:47.040 They don't have it anymore.
00:10:48.500 They recreated it.
00:10:49.740 Fine.
00:10:50.720 But that means it's not the real thing for Moses, Abraham, and the previous prophets.
00:10:54.600 You're doing it from memory.
00:10:55.960 Fine.
00:10:56.420 Good.
00:10:56.800 I'm sure you got a lot of it right.
00:10:58.280 But it's not God's.
00:10:59.740 It's you.
00:11:00.600 Yes.
00:11:01.200 That's what it says.
00:11:02.200 Then the same is true of the New Testament.
00:11:04.240 You don't really have what Jesus said.
00:11:06.320 You had what people said that Jesus said.
00:11:08.400 Take a look at the beginning of the book of Luke.
00:11:10.560 And it said it seems fair to him that everybody else has got an opinion.
00:11:15.180 Here he wants to tell Theophilus about here's how it is and blah, blah, blah.
00:11:21.560 It's right there in the beginning of Luke.
00:11:23.980 So, you understand that they didn't actually have Jesus on the spot with a recorder
00:11:30.460 like we've got here.
00:11:31.600 And they didn't really have anything from his hand that had been written.
00:11:35.460 What we do know from the very oldest manuscripts is not what they have in some of their stuff today.
00:11:42.620 Things were added over the centuries for clarification, better, maybe beautification,
00:11:48.740 to give a better sense of things.
00:11:50.640 But they were added.
00:11:51.800 Especially when you want to embellish an opinion that doesn't really exist there or is not that clear.
00:12:00.560 For instance, we'll take the first book of John 1.
00:12:05.460 Not John the Apostle.
00:12:07.900 This is John's letter.
00:12:09.420 Somebody else.
00:12:10.280 They call them John's.
00:12:11.880 And in one case they said they're not even sure it was somebody named John.
00:12:15.180 1, 2, and 3.
00:12:16.580 They followed that.
00:12:17.580 That's the only place in the entire Bible that they can point to and try to come up with a trinity.
00:12:24.460 And how they did it was to take a verse that preceded it and manipulate the words.
00:12:32.940 What it originally said was, again, it's still a translation.
00:12:36.820 In the translation it said,
00:12:38.120 There are three that bear witness.
00:12:43.560 Which is the Father, the blood, and the Spirit.
00:12:47.640 And these three agree.
00:12:49.860 That's what it said.
00:12:51.580 They bear witness.
00:12:52.980 And there are three that share the same witness.
00:12:55.500 I saw a car accident.
00:12:57.200 You saw a car accident.
00:12:58.320 He saw a car accident.
00:12:59.580 Okay?
00:13:00.000 And we agree.
00:13:01.600 Well, then they added another verse.
00:13:03.760 There's a takeoff from that.
00:13:04.760 It said, There are three that bear witness in heaven, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit.
00:13:09.100 And these three are one.
00:13:10.900 Okay.
00:13:11.580 But today...
00:13:11.940 And even then, it would have to be their one in agreement.
00:13:15.060 Because three doesn't equal one.
00:13:16.500 One doesn't equal three.
00:13:17.500 Hello.
00:13:18.460 But that's where they pulled it from.
00:13:20.160 So, these kinds of things are clarified in the Quran.
00:13:23.700 So, we put a website out there for it.
00:13:25.540 There's another one, though, where I went into detail about the Bible.
00:13:29.400 Now, this one for Protestants is excellent. 0.64
00:13:31.840 And it's called 9-1-1 Bible.
00:13:36.120 9-1-1 Bible, yeah.
00:13:37.240 And the links will be below.
00:13:38.240 They can see on the screen.
00:13:39.200 I'm sure they're there by now.
00:13:41.940 Alhamdulillah.
00:13:42.700 Well, listen, Ali, it was great to be with you today.
00:13:44.980 I hope that all of your viewers will take a chance to come and use our new app.
00:13:51.860 Yes.
00:13:52.300 We have an app.
00:13:53.160 It's called searchforislam.com.
00:13:56.380 Okay.
00:13:56.940 Because then they can do anything they want to.
00:13:59.180 Go to searchforislam, download the app.
00:14:01.000 Or if you don't have that kind of phone, if you've got a dumb phone, don't have a smart one,
00:14:06.020 you can go to the internet, searchforislam.com.
00:14:10.300 Type in a keyword like jihad, sharia, war, terrorism, wives, beating people, anything you want to put in there. 0.62
00:14:21.500 And then you'll find tons of stuff.
00:14:24.280 You'll find articles and videos.
00:14:26.780 Because we have over 2,500 websites to help people better understand really slam and simple English.
00:14:34.540 Because you have to put in that school, if you want to finish up, if you summarize a couple of words,
00:14:38.360 what a person that's ready to accept Islam or is on the verge of what steps should they take?
00:14:42.720 There's only one step.
00:14:45.780 When people ask me this question, somebody's close to Islam, what does he need to do?
00:14:50.780 Our only advice to them is, this is not between you and God.
00:14:55.540 You can't do it for getting married.
00:14:57.320 You can't do it for a spouse.
00:14:59.100 You can't do it for money.
00:15:00.400 You can't do it to show off.
00:15:01.700 You can't do it to gain fame.
00:15:04.440 No.
00:15:04.760 You're doing this for what reason?
00:15:07.440 And if it is sincere and you're doing it for God, then who should you talk to?
00:15:12.520 Alone, without any partners.
00:15:14.020 And you should be alone without anybody around you bothering you.
00:15:18.180 And just say in your heart, God, you guide me.
00:15:22.620 And when a person does that, then there's nothing else you and I can say.
00:15:27.140 That's finished.
00:15:28.400 Right?
00:15:28.920 Thank you very much.
00:15:29.660 Like I said.
00:15:30.200 You're going to keep my microphone on.
00:15:31.700 All right.
00:15:32.320 You can keep it.
00:15:32.880 You can keep it.
00:15:33.740 May Allah bless you.
00:15:34.560 Seriously, it's such a pleasure.
00:15:35.920 Like I said to you, and I've said it before, I've never in a million years before I'll be here talking to you.
00:15:40.020 So it's a pleasure.
00:15:40.600 And we should not underestimate the power of Dua and where you can be and where Allah can be with you.
00:15:44.220 So may Allah bless you.
00:15:45.560 And you.
00:15:46.280 Thank you.
00:15:46.720 Thank you.
00:15:47.260 Thank you.
00:15:47.960 Thank you.