Ali Dawah - August 14, 2018


UBER RIDERS ASK MEANING OF LIFE - UBER TALKS


Episode Stats


Length

8 minutes

Words per minute

216.42023

Word count

1,854

Sentence count

168

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

6

sentences flagged


Summary

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

In this episode, I speak to a friend of mine who has a very interesting story to tell. He talks about his upbringing and how he came to believe in God. I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I enjoyed recording it!

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 I would not have thought you'd have issues with your family.
00:00:14.000 That's why I love Uber, you always have a lovely conversation.
00:00:16.000 Well, that's one of the reasons I did it, to be honest.
00:00:18.000 So yeah, anyways, what was we saying?
00:00:20.000 Yeah, so basically, my dad didn't like it, so he kicked me out of the house.
00:00:25.000 And then afterwards, I stayed at my mate's house.
00:00:29.000 And then afterwards, he's become okay now, he's much better than before.
00:00:33.000 Because he thought, I'm just going to be some extremist period.
00:00:37.000 So yeah, what was your question, you said?
00:00:41.000 So my question was...
00:00:43.000 What made me?
00:00:44.000 Yeah, like what inspired you to take religion up?
00:00:46.000 I'm quite interested by that.
00:00:47.000 Because with me, like personally, I've been like christened and that kind of thing,
00:00:52.000 but I've never really taken into religion.
00:00:55.000 But I just want to know what to do.
00:00:57.000 You know what it was?
00:00:59.000 I was thinking to myself about the lifestyle that I was living.
00:01:03.000 With me, I just thought about it.
00:01:05.000 Life is just about money, cars, girls and all that kind of stuff.
00:01:08.000 But what it is, I had a lot of deaths around me.
00:01:14.000 So that was just one part of it.
00:01:16.000 I want to say that was just the main thing.
00:01:18.000 Yeah, for example, my cousin committed suicide.
00:01:20.000 Then his mate hanged himself in the park about a few weeks after.
00:01:24.000 And then my neighbour killed himself.
00:01:26.000 So I was like, that's madness, what's going on?
00:01:28.000 So it was just like, death was just like, okay, you know, just like a little reminder.
00:01:31.000 But then afterwards, what happened was...
00:01:34.000 Obviously, I'm chasing this lifestyle that I want to be.
00:01:36.000 And then I met this guy who was quite wealthy.
00:01:38.000 He had everything going for him.
00:01:40.000 And I see him always depressed and it's never happened.
00:01:42.000 I'm thinking to myself like, I want to be like you.
00:01:45.000 And you're here just crying.
00:01:47.000 They're not even happy with your life.
00:01:49.000 And I'm thinking like, this doesn't add up.
00:01:51.000 So I was just thinking, is this really happiness?
00:01:53.000 Because you look at the lifestyle of a lot of rappers, be it rich people.
00:01:58.000 Most of them are depressed.
00:01:59.000 And for them to perform, they have to take drugs to be on stage.
00:02:03.000 So I was just questioning, what is really happiness?
00:02:05.000 You know?
00:02:06.000 And then, I'm just thinking about it.
00:02:08.000 And you know, it's just looking for your purpose.
00:02:10.000 Because if I said to you guys, yeah?
00:02:12.000 If you're on a train, yeah?
00:02:14.000 And you have...
00:02:15.000 Yeah.
00:02:16.000 Or wherever.
00:02:17.000 You're on this plane and you've got anything you want.
00:02:18.000 Everything there, yeah?
00:02:19.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:02:20.000 At one point, you're going to ask yourself, who put me here and where is this plane going?
00:02:26.000 Yeah?
00:02:27.000 You're going to ask yourself that question.
00:02:28.000 Because you're going to ask yourself, who put me on this plane and where on earth am I going?
00:02:31.000 So that's the question that I would ask myself on this earth, who put us here?
00:02:35.000 What am I doing here?
00:02:36.000 I didn't choose to look like this.
00:02:37.000 I didn't choose my mum, my dad, my name, my brother, my sister.
00:02:40.000 It's the same with everyone.
00:02:41.000 Do you get what I'm trying to say?
00:02:42.000 Yeah, yeah.
00:02:43.000 So those things were making me a bit curious and making me wonder.
00:02:46.000 And then I would look at my, it might be funny to you guys, but looking at my socks, yeah?
00:02:51.000 And I'm thinking, my socks have a purpose, yeah?
00:02:53.000 It's designed and it has a purpose, yeah?
00:02:56.000 So I'm thinking to myself, my stinky socks have a purpose.
00:03:00.000 And there's me and I'm designing this way, you know?
00:03:03.000 Be it my eye, my hand, my finger print, whatever it may be.
00:03:05.000 Like, what's my purpose in life?
00:03:07.000 Did I just pop it out, you know?
00:03:09.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:03:10.000 So it was just those things, those elements in my life were just like making me think a lot.
00:03:13.000 And I always believed in high intelligence.
00:03:15.000 I always believed there was a creator, you know?
00:03:18.000 Yeah, yeah.
00:03:19.000 I agree.
00:03:20.000 There must be something.
00:03:21.000 There has to be, there has to be.
00:03:22.000 There's two points I want to raise after I've spoken.
00:03:24.000 Yeah.
00:03:25.000 So that's it in a nutshell.
00:03:26.000 Two things I would say.
00:03:27.000 The first thing was that in terms of the creator, you can say that there is a creator,
00:03:36.000 but then how do you define who the creator is?
00:03:38.000 Exactly.
00:03:39.000 Because if you are, you'll have a different perspective on things.
00:03:40.000 Exactly.
00:03:41.000 And therefore, you'll have a different view.
00:03:42.000 And also, how do you differentiate from, you know, your friend or someone on the other
00:03:46.000 side of the world?
00:03:47.000 Yeah.
00:03:48.000 Having a view on what the creator is versus yours, you know?
00:03:51.000 Exactly.
00:03:52.000 Because there's like hundreds of gods, let's say.
00:03:53.000 Exactly.
00:03:54.000 So that's the thing.
00:03:55.000 With me personally, what I did is I embarked on this journey.
00:03:58.000 When I first acknowledge that I must have a purpose, yeah?
00:04:01.000 Then the question that was like, what is my purpose and who is my creator?
00:04:04.000 You know, that's the question that I would ask myself.
00:04:07.000 By the way, just let me know where it is, yeah?
00:04:08.000 I'll just park up.
00:04:09.000 If you guys need to go, you can go back down.
00:04:10.000 I don't want to go back down.
00:04:11.000 I don't want to go back down.
00:04:12.000 Yeah.
00:04:13.000 So basically, what it comes down to is, for example, I did not believe in religion.
00:04:17.000 Yeah.
00:04:18.000 I thought, oh, religion is all man-made and the control, the masses, et cetera.
00:04:21.000 Yeah.
00:04:22.000 But when you believe in a high intelligence, by default, you have to believe that you must
00:04:25.000 have some kind of communication, like something for us to get to know him.
00:04:29.000 Who is he?
00:04:30.000 And when I'm in here, I'm not as a male, you know?
00:04:33.000 Yeah.
00:04:34.000 What is that something?
00:04:35.000 What's it want from us?
00:04:36.000 Because when we buy a product, it always comes with a manual.
00:04:37.000 It tells you how to use a product, what to do with it, what not to do with it.
00:04:40.000 Do you get what I'm trying to say?
00:04:41.000 So as human beings, I thought, you know, if God exists, you know, a creator exists, you
00:04:46.000 know, he would want what's best for us and he would tell us how to live our lives.
00:04:49.000 So that's when I embarked on my journey and said, look, there is a religion that's the
00:04:52.000 truth, but which religion it is?
00:04:55.000 Is it?
00:04:56.000 Yeah.
00:04:57.000 Which religion is it?
00:04:59.000 So I did a lot of research.
00:05:00.000 I looked at Christianity, I looked into Islam, I looked into the Old Testament, a bit of
00:05:05.000 Sikhism, a bit of Hinduism.
00:05:06.000 Stop around here, grab that.
00:05:07.000 Anyway, yeah.
00:05:08.000 No problem.
00:05:09.000 Yeah.
00:05:10.000 So like for me, I'm exactly the same as you, I think there must be some higher intelligence
00:05:18.000 religion that we can't, like, crack our brains around.
00:05:21.000 Yeah, exactly.
00:05:22.000 But there's so many, like, manuals out there.
00:05:24.000 Exactly.
00:05:25.000 It's like, which one do you go for?
00:05:27.000 Exactly.
00:05:28.000 With me personally...
00:05:29.000 If you go for one manual, it's like, have I gone for the wrong manual?
00:05:32.000 Exactly, exactly.
00:05:33.000 Yeah.
00:05:34.000 Yeah.
00:05:35.000 Me personally, it's like, I had a criteria for myself, yeah?
00:05:40.000 I said, if there's any scripture that I'm going to accept as a criteria, it should not
00:05:44.000 be changed.
00:05:45.000 It should have some kind of, like, something in it, like miracles, whatever it may be that
00:05:48.000 I can, you know, understand.
00:05:50.000 Now, with, I found that with the Qur'an.
00:05:53.000 Why did I find that with the Qur'an?
00:05:54.000 Because it was the only scripture that hasn't been altered, has not been changed, is still
00:06:00.000 preserved.
00:06:01.000 Not only that, millions of people have memorized.
00:06:03.000 You'll have little kids that have memorized the entire Qur'an.
00:06:05.000 Yeah.
00:06:06.000 And also, it talks about, like, historical miracles.
00:06:07.000 It talks about, you know, the Pharaoh.
00:06:11.000 If you look into it, like, for example, historical miracles, linguistic miracles, scientific miracles.
00:06:16.000 When I mean scientific miracles, it talks about the embryo, or, like, the development
00:06:20.000 of, the development of, for example, how, in the mother's womb, it developed.
00:06:25.000 So, the thing is, with me, that was the only scripture that stood out for me.
00:06:30.000 Because when you look into the Bible, without an offense to the Christians, of course, it's
00:06:34.000 been changed, it's been corrupted.
00:06:35.000 If you look into the Old Testament, it has, men have played a role in it.
00:06:39.000 You get what I'm trying to say?
00:06:40.000 And with Islam, we don't believe they're, like, separate religions.
00:06:43.000 What we believe is, they were sent down from the same Creator, yeah?
00:06:47.000 So, the way to know, we don't see there's one, there's different religions, yeah?
00:06:52.000 Now they've become different religions. 0.93
00:06:53.000 But it's the same message, all in, like, previous times, sent to different nations, yeah?
00:06:58.000 At different times.
00:06:59.000 So, it's like, you have the Old Testament, you have the New Testament, and we believe the
00:07:03.000 Quran is the Final Testament. 1.00
00:07:04.000 So, we, as Muslims, have to believe in Jesus, in Moses.
00:07:08.000 We need to believe in the...
00:07:09.000 Do you believe that?
00:07:10.000 Yes.
00:07:11.000 Do you actually believe that?
00:07:12.000 Yeah, yeah.
00:07:13.000 We believe that.
00:07:14.000 So, the thing is, when it comes to, like, the Creator, the way I believe, I know, is
00:07:18.000 because I believe the Quran has proven to me, because you have to look into it.
00:07:22.000 This is just like a little nutshell, yeah?
00:07:23.000 Yeah, yeah.
00:07:24.000 Once you acknowledge that, then the question comes to, who is God?
00:07:27.000 Because once you establish and acknowledge that this book is from God Almighty, then whatever
00:07:32.000 God tells about Himself, then you accept that.
00:07:34.000 Because we don't believe God is a man.
00:07:36.000 Because we believe God is the most powerful.
00:07:38.000 Men is not. 0.94
00:07:39.000 Men die. 0.74
00:07:40.000 Men eat. 0.98
00:07:41.000 Men go toilet. 0.99
00:07:42.000 Yeah.
00:07:43.000 You believe it's like a...
00:07:44.000 Exactly.
00:07:45.000 That's one thing that I really like about his time, because in Christianity, they believe
00:07:48.000 God came down as a man and died.
00:07:50.000 And we're like, okay, God is the one who made us.
00:07:52.000 How did He die?
00:07:53.000 Well, if He's a man, He eats food.
00:07:55.000 If He eats food, He has to go to the toilet.
00:07:57.000 How can I worship someone?
00:07:58.000 Do you get what I'm trying to say?
00:07:59.000 In that context.
00:08:00.000 I don't think this wasn't God.
00:08:01.000 He was just...
00:08:02.000 I don't think He's the son of God.
00:08:03.000 Yeah, some people believe He's the son of God.
00:08:04.000 Some believe He's a prophet.
00:08:05.000 Some believe He's a part of God.
00:08:06.000 They actually believe that, yeah.
00:08:07.000 Really?
00:08:08.000 Yeah.
00:08:09.000 I'm not sure.
00:08:10.000 Yeah, but what I would see, I've got some videos, like I said before.
00:08:13.000 Check them out.
00:08:14.000 Watch them.
00:08:15.000 Your clarity.
00:08:16.000 And if you have the chance, you know, read the Qur'an.
00:08:18.000 Mate, very nice to meet you.
00:08:19.000 Pleasure, man.
00:08:20.000 Very good to meet you.
00:08:21.000 Yeah, I know.
00:08:22.000 Very interesting.
00:08:23.000 The best, most insightful Uber I've ever had.
00:08:26.000 I know, yeah.
00:08:27.000 Really good to meet you.
00:08:28.000 Bye bye.
00:08:29.000 Okay, man, guys.
00:08:30.000 It's a pleasure.
00:08:31.000 Take care, bro.
00:08:32.000 Have fun.
00:08:33.000 Bye bye.