Contradicting Community

Going to Where the People Are

Now, how do we do this? How do we do this? First and foremost, don't expect the people to come to you. You have to go to the people. You have to do that. You have to start thinking like that. And you know where the people are? Let me tell you where the people are. They're not in nice places. They're at the shisha place. They're at the pool place. They're playing at the ballpark where the guys use foul language all the time. Right? They're at those places. I'm not saying you become one of them. But you know what? Those are the members of this ummah.

Love for the Ummah

And when they said, la ilaha illallah at any point in their life, they become more beloved to me than what blood makes. The connection that I'm formed with blood. This is thicker than blood. We are concerned about them. We love them for the sake of Allah. We start thinking in terms of amr bil ma'ruf and nahi 'an al-munkar.

We start bashing and cursing the Muslims who sell alcohol or who own these haram businesses or that do haram things on the internet, etc. Did anybody stop to think maybe I should try and save this person? What if this person was your brother? What if this person was your neighbor? What if it was your best friend? Would you just hate on them just like that? We don't have love for this ummah. We're too quick to pass judgment on them.

Treating People as Human Beings

We have to find a way to start pulling them in slowly. You can't do that until you treat people like human beings. You can't do that. If you treat them like evildoers or just labeled fasiq or deviant or whatever else. Their aqidah is messed up, forget them. No, no, no, no, no. These are the assets of this ummah. Allah gave them the blessing of la ilaha illallah because Allah sees something in them. And Allah gave us whatever He gave us, whatever concern He gave us because He expects us to do something with it. He expects something out of it.

So this is the first thing I want to at least, there should be a discussion in your circles. I can't give you the answers I can at least give you the problem. In your own circles there needs to be a discussion. How do we reach out to these youth? How do we work with them?

Examples of Youth Outreach

I'll give you a couple of interesting stories. There was a youth group, I won't mention where it was that, you know, had messed up kids too. Because they used to play basketball and they used to go out and hang out later on, eat at the restaurant. Nothing religious for a while. And the guy running the youth

group was very religious. And I told him, just run the group, man. Just don't worry about teaching them anything. Just run the thing.

And the masjid has a ball gym, a basketball gym. So they come in and they play ball. They play late at night. They're using filthy language in the masjid gym. If an uncle sees it especially a daisy uncle, what's going to happen? Oh, forget about it. Yeah, so he's like, get out of here, you know, and don't come back. Hey, what kind of masjid? Right?

Now tell me this, this guy with tattoos all over his body rings in places you wouldn't want playing basketball. You curse him out, where's he going to go? What's the next step? If he's not here, he's at the club. He's somewhere else. At least he's here. At least he'll hear the adhan for maghrib. Maybe he might even join us for salah one day in a few weeks. Maybe. But somebody has to treat this person like what? A person, a human being. Someone worth, you know, saving. Or at least that they should be given the message in a decent fashion. They deserve that one.

The Drunk Man at Tarawih

Now, give you another example. Just what's going on at the masjid. Ramadan, two years ago. A guy totally drunk. I mean, this guy is drunk. Muslim guy. Walks into the masjid during tarawih prayer. Can't even stand straight. Guess what happens next? They kick him out. Dude, he came to the masjid. Does that tell you something? Does that tell you that he's trying to seek help? Does that tell you he's trying to quit? Why would he bring himself in the middle of humiliation? Why would he do that? He needs help. The only help you provide was curse and yell and take him out. This is what we do to Muslims. Imagine what we do to non-Muslims. This is a Muslim.

The Vietnamese Convert Story

Now I'll give you a non-Muslim story. You may have heard this one on a video somewhere. True story again. So this guy, he's a Vietnamese guy. He's Muslim. And his co-worker is an idol worshiper. Vietnamese have a lot of different idol worship sort of religious traditions. And he's one of them. I forget which one specifically. But the co-worker, the idolatrous co-worker says to his Muslim co-worker, Hey man, I want to come with you to your worship on Friday.

So the guy keeps putting him off. No, no, no. I don't know. I don't think you're ready. But he keeps insisting so he takes him to the masjid. So they go to the masjid. And they go to the masjid and he looks around and everybody's making ruku and sujood and qiyam. So that's before Jummah time. And he says, man, where's the statue? Because everybody's kind of doing this stuff but I don't see any statue.

He says, oh no, we don't have a statue. You can't put an image to the master of the world. He's beyond images. That would be putting a limit on him. He says, that's amazing. How do you pray to this God? Just

like these people are praying. So he sees people doing what? Qiyam, ruku, sujood. He says, ah, I get it. He went down like that. Guess where he learned that from? From his own religion. Right?

So this brother sees this from a distance. His brother sees it from a distance. In the spirit of amr bil ma'ruf and nahi 'an al-munkar he gets up, he comes over, grabs the guy by the shirt, drags him outside the masjid, throws him out and says, until you learn to make the salah according to the sunnah, don't you come back.

Our Unpreparedness for Dawah

We at the masjid level are not ready to deal with the people that need our help. We're not ready. What if a woman inappropriately dressed walks into the masjid? What's going to happen? What if a guy that's covered in tattoos like some MMA fighter or something walks into the masjid? The elders in the masjid, oh my god, dajjal came so early? You know? All hell will break loose. We're not ready to deal with people.

What da'wah are we talking about? What are the da'wah centers? You don't need to build a da'wah center. They're already built. What are they? It's the masjid. And who are the da'is of the masjid? The students of knowledge, the youth. They are the eyes and the ears of this ummah. They are the faculties of this work. You.

Your Critical Role

So you have to understand, number one, the critical role that you're in as far as the work of this ummah is concerned. But I want to bring you closer to home. Remember I said when you turn a religious leaf, who starts noticing you're changing? Let's talk about that a little bit.

Family Reactions to Your Religious Change

Your family starts noticing that you're not taking that thing off your head. Your family also starts noticing that it's getting a little fuzzy out here. And your friends have the fuzzy stuff too. Your friends change. You don't hang out with those other boys anymore. Your mom gets a little concerned. She says, I want you to be Muslim, but not Muslim Muslim. This is not why you came to America. Right? They get concerned.

The mother says to the daughter, the father says to the daughter, who's going to marry you looking like that? We don't do this back then in our family. Why don't you act like the rest of the family? You're embarrassing us. We can't take you to the wedding looking like that. We can't take you here. You know people that face this.

Becoming Outcasts in Your Own Home

In other words, what's happened is the people that are trying to hold on to any strand of the religion have become the outcasts of the ummah. In their own home. They have become the outcasts. You're the

weirdos. This is the weirdo convention right here. We are the outcasts of our own family. We are the objects of ridicule.

You go to the Eid gathering, for most of you, Oh, Maulana is here. Issue me the fatwa, huh? So, is this haram too? Is that haram? Remember last year when you used to be partying with us? What happened now? All religious now? Okay. We get it. We understand. You become the object of ridicule. And through you, Islam.

The Danger of Snapping at Parents

And when you hear Islam being made fun of or halal and haram being played around with at the end of a coffee table, what happens to you, young Muslim? Grrrr! And when that happens to you, what do you do? Astaghfirullah! This is a bid'ah. Your people, your aqeedah is messed up. Oh, you're following your culture not the religion slam the door walk out and then your parents come back to you and say oh So this is what the religion teaches you right talk to your parents like that It got you good. I Got you on lock

Understand this when you become serious about the religion be mentally prepared some of you are blessed with you know Very good families alhamdulillah, but many of you have this trial or you know people who have this trial You know One of the worst things in our deen one of the worst things in our deen is So much as talking back to our parents

Understanding Your Parents' Psychology

Right now know this know this as a reality I see a lot of young faces here, so I say this know this your father for the sons here your father knows Exactly what to say to get under your skin and make it burn He knows exactly what to say and he knows that it burns too, and he says it anyway You know why not because he hates you because he wants to see what you're going to do next He wants to test your patience, and if you do snap if you do flip out He's gonna say aha. This is what the religion teaches you This is what that imams been telling you. Oh, this is what that deen has taught you.

That's what's gonna happen You come back you come back with a B in your math in your calculus class guess what's gonna be blamed your religion your religion You lose your job guess what's gonna be blamed Your religion by who not some non-Muslim your family. This is because of that case of yours This is because you're always going to the masjid. That's why they probably fired you This is why you failed in other words all of your successes will be overlooked and all of your failures will be attributed to

The Psychological War at Home

Psychological war inside your home it's a psychological battle inside your home and You're if you want all of the good that you're trying to do you're trying to attend classes go to conferences sit in the company Of good people listen to hours and hours of lectures stay away from music stay away from movies stay

away from bad companies Keep your eyes low. Oh my god There's so much to do you want all of that multiply that by zero talk back to your parents for a second and we do We do if we can't take it it gets under our skin it boils over and we say oh How dare you and then you just that one time you snap done

There's a reason that Allah puts, you know, the gratitude the gratefulness to them at such a high regard and you know If your blood boils if they do something wrong I would think Ibrahim's blood would boil a lot more because his dad makes idols Talk about a bad aqeedah Right, he makes them how does he talk to him? Respect love.

يَا أَبَتِ - "O my beloved father" (Quran 19:42)

My beloved father, he's kicking him out of the house. He says I may ask my master to forgive you and he's getting kicked out of the house. Not I'm on the Sunnah. No It's not that discourse it's a different discourse

Learning to Grow Thick Skin

We have to learn you have to learn to grow a thick skin I'll tell you a personal story. You'll enjoy this story My dad experimented with me and my mom taught me she realized what he's doing and she said listen You need to understand to learn how to play the game. And then I was like, oh, I've been a dummy for so long I didn't know, you know, my dad my dad loves to do this He comes to me and says I was listening to that Shia speaker He's so good and he makes a lot of good points and he just goes on and on on top of the Shia guy And you know how they have really good arguments and stuff. I'm losing. I'm cringing Like my face is turning colors and then my mom told me how to play the game So the next time he came up to me and said that I said, yeah, I heard him. He's awesome. I Mean his arguments were unbelievable. My dad says don't listen to him So I ended that conversation right there

Understanding Your Parents Know You

But the idea is Know that your parents will psychologically test you you think they don't understand man. They were changing your diapers. They understand you They know what you're all about. They've sized you up They have don't underestimate them. Oh, no, they don't get it. They don't understand my concerns about Islam. They do please They do relax learn to first develop the family relations if you are studying the deen and you're destroying family relations at the same time Priorities are somewhere. They shouldn't be You need to fix family ties. This is a fundamental of our religion It's a fundamental premise of our deen

Why Allah Put You in That Family

And now let me tell you what the last thing I want to share with you about my rant about how there's this dichotomy You don't have to raise your hands. I'm gonna make I'm gonna stereotype all of you. Anyway,

I've already stereotyped you as the weirdos in your family Why would Allah put you in that family? Anyway, why wouldn't he put you like in Abu Hadifa's family or like Imam Ashrafi's lineage where all your uncles are Huffadh of Quran and Muhaddithun.

Why do you have a sister? That's so inappropriate Why do you have a brother? That's oh my god. I don't believe this guy Why do you have cousins that are just completely on a different planet if they were not family? You would have never met them. You would never even want to look at them They're so different from you and that's to me.

This is my understanding - Allah made us family with people So we could become Islam's ambassadors to them because nobody else was going to reach to them who was going to reach to them We were when you're giving when I'm giving a speech to you guys. You're actually here to listen to me Let me try giving the speech to my cousin Let me try giving it to my uncle Let me try giving it to my mother. How's it gonna go?

"Bas yaar" (That's it) That's Urdu. I'll be quiet Right get out of here. You know Sheikh Yasir, his parents came and I was really honored he came and he told me that you came to see me I was like he didn't come to see you. He goes it's just me Right family is family It's just family

Your Status in the Family

So you will get overlooked you may have a lot of respect. You're running the halaqah. You're the MSA president You're the khatib. You're this you're that you're the leader of your study group. You're you know You're the guy that went to this summit from the community, but you're nothing in the family You're nothing Get used to that Make da'wah as a nothing Make da'wah as a nothing Learn learn to take the hits Learn to take the insults and live with them pull people out slowly change their behavior towards you Be the best to your family and that is the da'wah of Islam.

What Your Family Really Needs

They don't need your speech They don't need the notes from this class They don't need the notes from this from the entire summit. They don't your family doesn't care for them They don't you know what they need they need you to go home without asking you vacuum the house for your parents You do the groceries you buy them some flowers you do stuff without even asking your dad always wants you to get better grades You focus on that one class to show your daddy You got those better grades not for the grades, but for your father because making your father happy will serve your deen in the end Think long- term think long-term start thinking about the relationship with your family

The Problem of Self-Righteousness

I've noticed too often too often too often young Muslims that are serious about religious learning are

overlooking family obligations They're overlooking family obligations And this is the bigger problem and the second tier problem is that they're becoming self-righteous without realizing it What does that mean they see other Muslims that are in sin? They see other Muslims that are doing haram, and they assume somehow that they are what? They're better or at least they're not doing that astaghfirullah wouldn't associate with those people. Where were you two years ago? Were you not there? Who pulled you out? Who pulled you out? Allah did

The Quranic Command for Unity

The way that Allah mentions this in the Quran the ayah about the journey of this ummah:

"O you who believe! Fear Allah as He should be feared, and die not except in a state of Islam" (Quran 3:102)

Taqwa was the first thing you developed Taqwa inside you that brought you to this concern about not dying unless you are what? Unless you're Muslim, and then what held you on to this? What was the next step?

"And hold fast, all of you together, to the rope of Allah, and be not divided among yourselves" (Quran 3:103)

But then when you hold on to this rope, which is the book of Allah. What is the next instruction وَلَا تَفَرَّقُوا don't divide among yourself.

What did we make as an easy observation about religious youth? What happens when they get religious immediately? Division is the first thing that's associated with them وَلَا تَفَرَّقُوا

What's the correct behavior?

"And remember the favor of Allah upon you - when you were enemies and He brought your hearts together and you became, by His favor, brothers. And you were on the edge of a pit of the Fire, and He saved you from it" (Quran 3:103)

Here Allah rescued you. So Allah is the one who rescued you. So instead of looking down upon the next person, find a way to rescue them.

A Story of Real Dawah

You know last story. I'll give you and I'm done inshallah. One of my heroes in the country as far as dawah is concerned and real genuine concern we should learn something from this brother is brother Eddie from the Deen Show. He's just corny sometimes and that's part of his deal. You know, it's all good

though. But if you because if you hang out with this guy he is a dawah machine. This guy is incredible. He is absolutely incredible.

He doesn't see "Oh man. What's this guy gonna think? What's that guy gonna think? I'm gonna talk to them about Islam." He will talk to everyone I mean we were at I was walking around just walking down the street with him and there's this guy in a wheelchair and we're just waiting just standing there waiting to cross the street. He turns over. "Don't you think we should just worship one God?" And the guy's like, "yeah, of course" He goes "that's what I'm saying. Most people just worry about themselves. They don't worry about the one who created them Don't you think so?" "Yeah, I do" Just have a five minute conversation and he says "here's my number I want you to come over by the way, this is Islam. This is when you really worship one God"

The Courage to Start Conversations

Who of us would have the courage to just start a conversation? "Man, this guy's gonna curse me out. He's gonna stab me." What's you know, if you're in New York, right? What else might happen? But subhanAllah, he doesn't see, you know, what might happen. He sees that he has a message to deliver Genuine concern genuinely concerned. His tenant. He's in a building and his tenants are some of these guys that are like, you know, they work out and stuff and they do that jujitsu stuff Right that Brazilian jujitsu, right There's non-muslim guys a lot of non-muslim guys. A lot of them have become Muslim, too

So this one guy he was I was staying with him at the apartment and this one guy one of his tenants It was about to go into his apartment, but his key got stuck For you know, sometimes keys can get stuck. Split- second. He says he goes. "Hey Mike. Come here. I want to talk to you Come inside. I want I got something for you" and he pulls him into the apartment where I'm staying You know, "you asked me I told you about Islam that other day. Yeah. Well, here's the guy you can ask everything you want" And put me on the spot You know this guy that the guy was talking to apparently he wanted to be an MMA fighter Literally tattoos everywhere and he wants to know about Islam

Don't Pass Judgment

Before passing judgment on who he is Just deliver the message. I know brothers that were skinheads they got their tattoos in prison they went to jail for allegedly killing black people or violating their rights, etc The most horrendous ways and when they got released and took Islam now, he has an African-American wife and a kid Right. Don't know Don't pass judgment. Don't pass judgment. Don't pass judgment.

This is this is the number one problem. We're having Let's undermine that discourse make that discussion about the ideological clash make it irrelevant. You've got bigger fish to fry. You got bigger problems There's a serious reality outside We have to face in our family among the youth of the Muslims and then talk about the Muslims at large

Closing Prayer

May Allah give us a sense of perspective and concern for the rest of this Ummah, may Allah teach us how to use our knowledge wisely and to deliver the words of advice and of nasiha in the place that is appropriate. May Allah put baraka in our words because in the end our words don't change people Allah changes people So may Allah put baraka in our words and reward us for the efforts that we make to serve his deen

Assalamu alaikum

Questions and Answers Session

Question: How to Help Families Through Islamic Content

For our families the institution now has become YouTube You know for the women in the house and stuff. They need to get hooked on some of this stuff that's available now and Some of it's really really good Some of it is really really good. You have to start finding You know, there are some speakers that are academic and there are other speakers that are just pure entertainment value Right and the student of knowledge says "I didn't learn anything from his speech" You didn't learn anything from his speech, but a lot of people started praying because they heard that speech Right, so don't judge a speaker just based on how many hadith did he quote how many ayat, etc, etc It's also about how did they impact people psychologically, right?

I'll give you an example. I went to the ISNA convention a couple of years ago, and I was listening to Imam Siraj You know, he's like a father figure to our community may Allah preserve him and continue to give him shifa You know, he's giving a speech that is his speech sometimes goes everywhere everywhere from like "once upon a time I had a dog" to like Everywhere and I'm passing by a truck all kinds of stories and at the end of it a serious student of knowledge will say "I don't know about that speech" But you know the guy next to me was like "man I got to start praying" he didn't say a word about prayer But it has that impact It has that impact so different people need different things.

So since you know, the temperament of your family members You have to find the kinds of stuff that they that might appeal to them And you have to be a little bit more creative in getting the message to them Your favorite speakers are not going to be their favorite speakers For example, right you have to use a little more creativity

The other thing that some masajid have done very successfully is they've they've made the masajid a place of halal social gathering So and one of the things that attracted me to the community that I moved to is The families get together all the time and so the masjid becomes the place to hang out and slowly religion comes into play Because you're at the masjid anyway So now just you know The women start

networking with other women that are in touch with the deen and it slowly starts it starts reeling them in It doesn't happen overnight Nothing happens overnight

Question: Dealing with Parental Tension

When when the child snaps at their parents you think there's tension right? Okay, go get their feet massaged. Go massage their feet. Don't move until they kick you off Okay, beg them to forgive you Kill your ego when it comes to your parents but kill your ego. Don't say "there's tension. We don't talk anymore He looks at me funny." That's your ego in the way. Get your ego out of the way Be at their feet They love you. Your mother gave you birth. Your dad held you in his arms. There's love there. It's your abruptness that caused that friction But it's you turning back into that loving child that will remove it immediately or over time But you have to start you have to tear away at it.

You have to crush your ego. Don't expect it from them Don't expect them to give you an inch But you have to give miles and miles and miles. You understand this is it's a difficult journey It requires sabr, but this is this is a kind of jihad. This is a kind of jihad in Surah Al-Ankabut, jihad with the parents:

"But if they endeavor to make you associate with Me that of which you have no knowledge, do not obey them but accompany them in [this] world with appropriate kindness" (Quran 31:15)

Don't obey them but accompany them at the same time

Question: Being Judgmental in Dawah

One issue being judgmental And it's very very common. It's like consistent fight within yourself to try not to be judgmental, not try to judge people But it's the same issue that you mentioned like when we try to act when we actually want to act as ambassadors of Islam We talk about Islam. We're just giving basic dawah. It's the whole idea of the Other person's reaction that gives you that idea I mean if the person feels benefited and he comes into something like that It gives you the first impression that you did it because I did something so you do understand that being judgmental Even though without doubt is not it's not excusable is a by-product of the fact that you have gained some knowledge, which is

Yeah, what I say judgmental, I'm not saying you shouldn't be aware of who they are No, no, I understand We do size them up. Basically we size people up. That's fine. We don't judge what's in their heart. We don't judge their potential It's okay to size somebody up and say "okay. This guy doesn't know much I better talk to him this way this way this way This person seems to have this kind of problem" You could you could you know This is a part of baseerah and this is part of having insight and this is kind of like, you know Knowing your audience so part of that is passing some sort of judgment But I'm saying not passing judgment on their character that "this guy's fate is sealed. How is he ever gonna change? How is he ever gonna come on seriously this guy?" No, don't don't pass that kind of judgment But yeah in that way you

do have to be cognizant of the age of the person you're talking to the temperament their mode of speech You have to take all these things into consideration before you speak and that's exactly what we're talking about in eloquence You need to psychologically assess your audience before you speak to them You need to kind of have an understanding of where they're coming from before you address them, right?

Question: Creating Youth Programs

First of all, you need to have amazing youth groups amazing youth groups You need I mean, I love YM. I really do. I Love any youth group. I don't mind MYNA, MSA, YM, MSA whatever it's something it's something for God's sake you can whine about it and say "this is their problem This is their problem. This is their problem" it's something We don't have an endless amount of resources. At least we got something Right, but the thing that I loved about YM in particular was they had guys that were in gangs Coming to YM meeting and like, you know playing ball or whatever

First of all, every masjid the biggest investment to me for teenagers: ball court Have a basketball court You better have it You better have like, you know ping-pong tables for the uncles really and the fact that we're playing tells you we're getting old Okay, but you need a nice basketball court. You need a sister's lounge a place where sisters can hang out You know some Muslims lose their way most in suburban towns Big cities Muslim population is big a lot of Muslims in college a lot of Muslims in high school You kind of sort of you know, even though you're messed up There's still places avenues you can find a social outlet like in Houston. There's a lot of Muslim youth hanging out, right? But in like Birmingham, Alabama Where are you gonna go to hang out? IHOP are you gonna go, right?

So what they did something really smart at the masjid there? They made a sister's lounge a brother's lounge and like this is a place to chill It's like there's a Starbucks inside the masjid or something. It's not a Starbucks Okay, they're just hanging out there they're doing homework there they're discussing there They're you know, they're socializing at the masjid the sisters among themselves brothers among themselves. They found an acceptable outlet to get together and when they're there the adhan is called and it's salah too, right?

But we need to create these alternatives and if they're not there We need to produce them and if you know, you don't have to solve the problems of hundreds of thousands of youth You know three or four kids that are messed up. You need to start hanging out with them a little bit Maybe one part of your Islamic work is that you take them out to dinner every once a week You don't discuss Islam with them for six months. It's okay build a bond with them first build a connection with them first Then maybe bring up a Hadith or two or maybe slip in a salah at the masjid, right?

It takes time you're dealing with people. They're not, you know, they're not robots, you know, "say this shahadah" "Okay, and you start praying" it doesn't work like that People take time in changing their

behavior But you have to build a bond with them first and that's that requires a lot of patience It requires a lot of patience.

I mean think about the work of the messenger of Allah. Think about the work of Nuh. It's not like he's talking to a different audience for 950 years Who's he talking to? Same bunch same bunch You try giving dawah to somebody they get annoyed with you in 45 minutes They get annoyed with you Then you come back to the same guy and they're annoyed again and then the same guy and you do it for a week Can you imagine trying to do that what the attitude of that person would become towards you Can you just imagine? The messengers go back to the same people Over and over and over and who do they go back to first? Who was the messenger commanded to warn first?

"And warn your closest kindred"

We're commanded to warn Those are the people that that we owe our dawah to first first So, you know develop that concern inshallah

Question: Balancing Truth with Gentle Approach

Just to just to reel them in we sort of water it down for them. That's a real problem the question is, you know Sometimes we try to bring the youth in and we try to connect with them and stuff But then they ask a pointed question like "is hijab really fard?" and you think in your head "man If I tell this girl, it's fard then she might never come back" Right, or "there's a brother if I tell him salah is fard five times, right? Then he might leave me and just go away" right and you out of that fear. You don't share that with them

Well, we are asked to speak the truth. You can't shy away from the truth. But the way you convey the truth is with hikmah. This is Allah's methodology in the Quran Right when he doesn't just tell you to obey him. What does he wrap the ayat of obedience with? Taqwa, look at Surah Nisa ayat of inheritance. Where did they begin? (يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ اتَّقُوا رَبَّكُمْ - ya ayyuha an-nasu ittaqu rabbakum) look at the ayat of divorce in Surah Baqarah, right? What is what keeps happening at the end of every ayah? (وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ وَاعْلَمُوا أَنَّ اللَّهَ بِمَا تَعْمَلُونَ بَصِيرٌ - wattaqullaha wa'lamu annallaha bima ta'maluna basir) right be fearful be in awe of Allah

So this this idea of developing Taqwa in people "why should you want to wear hijab anyway?" You know just bring them take it back to the root every time don't just answer with a yes or a no Make it an opportunity for advice, right? That's what they really need They need heartfelt sincerely felt advice You know a lot of times people that are disconnected from the religion want to turn the religious discussion into "what is halal and what is haram" and that's it? And they want to make that debate out of it. "I don't think it's that bad" You know and they bring it to you from an ethical point of view other points of view When you get questions like that, you need to redirect them in what direction? The fundamental cause

So for the Muslim you're not calling them to iman because they have some of that already You're calling them to Taqwa "fear Allah be cautious of Allah You know, he's done so much for us What should we do

for him? What do you think?" You know? So you put it in a psychological way, you don't necessarily try to intellectualize the issue You try to put it in a you know, sort of a heartfelt kind of a way It's very important just how you speak to people, right? Because if you don't speak to them like that, it feels like you're trying to win an argument And you'll never win that way even if you're right you lose Even if you win the argument you lose because they become antagonistic towards you

Question: Dealing with Difficult Uncles

How do you deal with those uncles who are like, who are trying to poke you? And the only thing they're interested in talking about is like politics if they're not poking you

Okay, the uncles that are trying to poke you, you should be the best of friends to them They, I mean, I know uncles. I should have done a PhD in uncle psychology, okay? I know uncles Uncles poke you because they get a kick out of irking you You become their friend, they'll stop bothering you You initiate the discussion. You don't walk away from it. "Hey, hey, come here, I gotta ask you something" No, no, no, you go to them You ask them. You say, "hey, I want to go grab some chai after the Salah" Chill out with the elders and they'll break the ice. You have to initiate that. A lot of times youth are allergic to the elders That's a problem. Right. I mean have a youth group, but that doesn't mean you alienate yourself from the elders Right, it's a big problem in our community that the two are at odds sometimes. They shouldn't be. It should be one cohesive whole

Closing Testimony About Cooperation

I think you did an excellent job. No, I was just saying there's a hadith that my friends and I we were in this youth group and we kind of talk about how we do dawah to these kids and we say that we each pick one kid or one or two kids and we try to focus on them We don't try to go for like the home run and get like 30 kids to come to Maghrib And alhamdulillah, we've had a lot of success and one of our mantras one of our main mottos is the hadith where Rasulullah tells us That if you are used by Allah to guide one person It is literally better than everything in the world like the entire world and everything in it and so You know what I was saying was that it might be you know Not as fun as coming to this summit having two weeks of jam-packed knowledge all the shuyukh and everything But remember the goal like remember the end is that you're getting something That's better than the world and everything in it inshallah.

Jazakallah khair and one of the things that really gives me a lot of optimism for the future is the amount of cooperation that we see for the first time Between so many different du'at and so many different institutions And I'll tell you in all honesty Al-Maghrib has stayed clear of politics and Anybody who is inshallah sincere for the dawah they find this from Al-Maghrib And we find it in them and we formed a cooperation We formed a very positive force for the ummah. What one teaches the other doesn't teach and it's something that Alhamdulillah everybody benefits from and this isn't just the first inshallah there are other mergers as well we're talking about other groups other organizations And I think that this

bodes well for the future Alhamdulillah It bodes well that a group of dedicated du'at and scholars and activists And you know Tajweed teachers and teachers of Arabic Nahw and Balagha and specialists in Fiqh and Aqeedah I mean Alhamdulillah. Do you guys not see the complementary nature of all of your instructors?

Wallahi, I wish I had this opportunity when I was 17, 18, 19 And then I had gone to Medina my level would have been something else when I went to Medina And he's an Arabic teacher so he can relate to this. I didn't even know a fa'il from a maf'ul I didn't know mansub from marfu' from majzum. I'm a student at Medina. I didn't even know the difference between Nahw and Sarf I had no clue what these sciences were. How I wish that I had this platform So that when I had gone abroad Allah knows where I would have been now and the goal is you guys build on The shoulders of other people like I built upon those who I studied with, right? That's the goal that we hope for every generation to come and to build upon what we have to offer

And it makes my heart melt to see all of these Instructors and du'at and activists all come together and we can be totally frank and say there are absolutely no politics that we have to hide And I'll tell you I've been working with many organizations. There are lots of politics with many organizations You all know this with many masjids, many groups Alhamdulillah, we're actually genuinely friends We actually call each other and we actually have a good time when we get together That's something very rare in an Islamic organization much less multiple Islamic organizations coming together And wallahi, this is a blessing from Allah and I think that the future inshallah ta'ala is bright and I am very optimistic about the future