 I'm Carol Schell, I'm the State Public Affairs Director for the Little More State. I've had the privilege to be a part of Tri Valley Interpay Center Connect for several years. I feel very blessed to have got to know so many wonderful people from their various cultures and religions in the Tri Valley. A little housekeeping before we get started, we have restrooms just outside this door and then back in the corner there are more restrooms. It has been several months since we met our Sophie and the Muslim Community Center at Pleasanton. When he presented this idea to me to have this event at our church I think it's been almost a year. He's agreeing with me back there, he's recording this. And finally, after many emails, lots of emails, Sarah and I in the mirror, lots of emails back and forth. It's so wonderful to have this all come together today. As members of the LDS Church we're so happy to be able to host this event. And I just want to share with you, back in October 2001, right after September 9-11, our then prophet of the church, Gordon B. Hinckley, spoke to all the LDS people throughout the world. And I just want to share a portion of what he shared with us at October following 9-11. This is his quote. This is not a matter of Christian against Muslim. We value our Muslim neighbors across the world and hope that those who live by the tenets of their faith will not suffer. I ask that our own people do not become a party to, in any way, to the persecution of the innocent. Rather, let us be friendly and helpful, protective and supportive. We'll begin with an invocation by President Scott Adams, first counselor in the Livermore presidency. Following invocation, we'd like to invite Assemblywoman Catherine Baker to say a few words. So we're grateful to be gathered here to gather as members of the community, as children of me. And we're grateful to host our Muslim brothers and sisters as well. I see that spirit will be with all of us and we'll be able to be educated and have a spirit of love and fellowship on one another. And I see that the spirit will be with all of us and we'll be able to be educated and have a spirit of love and fellowship on one another. So we will make a mixture way up. We'll just share a little bit about her. She's represented the California 16th Assembly District since 2014. Before joining the Assembly, she worked as an attorney advising small businesses, individuals and nonprofits. Catherine earned her bachelor's degree from the University of Chicago and a law degree from UC Berkeley. Go there. She's married to her college sweetheart, Dan, and they have two children. And then I did do a little Facebook stalking yesterday, just a little bit, an hour or two. And go to her Facebook page. She's just involved in a lot of great things in her community, including many interfaith activities. Thank you for having me. Thank you to deliver more state for those students here. It is wonderful to be here. This is about the, I think, youth for me here. And at this time, happiness, understanding one another better. I attended a program, I want to say in October or November, Pleasanton State, I believe, on the importance of religious tolerance in the world, hosted there. And many messages came to me from that program. But one was how much more peaceful and productive societies are when they are tolerant of one another. And how critically important it is to our well-being and our opportunity to thrive as individuals, regardless of your faith. And the examples, the by, all throughout the world and all throughout history. And part of being able to be tolerant and accepting more another is learning about one another. And it gives us an opportunity to find our areas of common belief and common respect and shared values and emphasize that more than areas where we might be different. And so I wanted to be sure to be here today. This is a day I usually block off just for family and laundry and groceries. That happens on the same day. But this is important for us to be together. So I say thank you and express great gratitude. And also to members of the panel and to members of this state and others in the Tri-Valley area who are part of our Interfaith Advisory Council. That I assembled last year to find out ways in which our state office and our community can be learning more about one another, bridging divides and differences and stand frankly in solidarity with one another when we feel another is under attack. And those members have been great counsel and advice to me throughout the last year. And I'm appreciative for it and will look for more opportunities. And with that I say Asalaamu Alaikum and I look forward to the program. Thank you for having me and for being here everyone today. Thank you. Over to our very distinguished panel. We're so excited that they've taken time out of their day to be with us. Aldi will be the moderator for this. So I will turn this up. Thank you. Let's show our love for the organizers, Carol. Parts of intimacy. And it's about when the three Abrahamic fates were competing with you. There was a civilization of time and history when the three Abrahamic fates lived together. And they competed in beauty. And that was how civilization was created in a beautiful manner. So anyone who wants a homework, the arts of intimacy. The arts of intimacy. And today is a stepping stone back in that direction. And I want to congratulate the organizers for taking this beautiful step and having this here today. One more time. The word etymologically comes from, it shares the meaning of a person who plays a flute and brings beauty to a chorus. And so that's what she's doing today. And Munir Asafi means illuminating purity. So we have some good organizers and hopefully we can live up to those standards today. So Martin Luther King says the greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge. And that's a very, very, very, and we're under predicament today. Because a lot of people actually unfortunately misunderstand Muslims or Islam. And so today the way we have our panel set up is first to remove, I call Henard first speaker, our myth buster, is to remove the false notions and misconceptions from what Islam, what isn't Islam. Followed by what, and Mike Kim, who also speaks on that wavelength. Followed by what is Islam. And so hopefully after we remove some of the feathers that prevent us from seeing a beautiful mountain of Islam from our eyes, then hopefully we can see more clearly the later panelists. And each panel speaks for approximately 15 minutes. When I was in law school I graduated in 2005 and my best friend was Mormon in law school. And he said, you know, we should be best friends because you're a Muslim and I'm Mormon and both of them have two M's. I was like, yes, I agree. And every Thursday they did something called bar review, right? There's something called bar review because a lawyer takes the bar in law school. And so they would come to me and say, hey, Mandy, come to the bar. And actually they weren't studying for the bar, they did a little different bar review. And so they'd say, Mandy, come with us. And then I'd say, hey, Mike Garrett's not going, don't talk to him. He's not going either. Don't talk to Mike because he wouldn't drink either. He was my boyfriend, Mike Garrett. And he was a gentleman. He was an awesome man and he made my law school experience better. So that's why I'm actually pretty excited to be here today. And I actually feel, with all the suits and ties, I actually feel like I'm in a law firm. Thank you for making me feel at home. I appreciate it. But I do want to thank you. I'm not going to welcome you to your own center, but I want to thank you. This is a meaningful step for me personally. I'm American, I've been here my whole life. Born and raised in Chicago, lived in Minnesota, lived in Orange County. And I've been here for about five years. And I was just talking earlier, I think, with Troy. Yes, sir. And Troy mentioned something. He said, you know, what motivates this is fear. You know, fear, fear of Muslims. And I said, you know, it's actually fear of Muslims and fear by Muslims. Because both parties are actually a little scary things, you know? So I have three daughters. And the title of this panel is called The Muslim Next Door. So it's almost like a personal touch. Like, who are these Muslims next door? Who are they? You know, what are they? You know, what do they eat? You know, one of my neighbor, my actually true neighbor, Jim and Judy. He's like, I want to have you over for dinner. But I don't know how to cook halal. So halal is actually just any chicken or beef or, you know, that you can get from a local, you know, like kosher, similar. So you can cook, you know, you can cook, you know, a shepherd's pie. Halal shepherd's pie, you know? And so there's a lot of mystery to be de-monthed and a lot of myths to be removed, hopefully, today. But I want to thank you because it's motivated by fear. I'm a father. And I have, you know, my daughter's right there. She's waving. Hey, man. I love you, baby. She's also my assistant. She's pretty good. She's wonderful. She, so her name, her name means faith. Her name means faith, blossoming faith with her middle name. And I would see myself living anywhere except in America. This is home. So when someone shouts, go home. Okay, I'll go to Chicago. Where do you want me to go? Vermont in California. That's where my wife is from. That's where she was born. And her parents are from UCLA. So where should we go? So this is home, and you're making this feel more homey. You know? So we've already succeeded because of you, because of Carolyn, because of me. And thank you. And so our first panelist, Hinda Mohtar, is a teacher, principal, manager of a homeschool co-op in Lafayette, California. She's a writer, speaker, and she's also a wife. And a mother. God bless her, I mean. She's a good friend of mine, and she's our mid-buster. And she's going to address some of the more common misconceptions. But at the end of our panel, we have the very important session, which is our Q&A session. So anything that we don't address, there are some no cards. Please feel free to write any question, and we'll talk about them at the end of our panel. Please do welcome Hinda Mohtar. Matthew and I did not compare our opening remarks, and I was going to say the same thing. My best friend in high school was a Mormon, and I still remember when I started high school. I actually, I'm not from Saudi Arabia, but I grew up there because my father's job was transferred there. And when we came back to California, and I was starting high school, my mom actually told me, look for the Mormon kids. They have similar values to us, and I like them, and I think they'll be a good company for you, so seek out the Mormon kids. My best friend was born in high school, for a lot of similarities and kind of experiences. So I would like to reiterate the thank you that Matthew asked along to all of you. And I wanted to make clear that, yeah, I'm here to nip us, and I also wanted to make clear what some of our goals are not. And two of our goals that we are not aiming for is one, we're not here to proselytize, and we're also not here to give our personal opinions or viewpoints on religion or politics. We, the five panelists up here represent a majority of the Muslim world, about 87% of Muslims are Orthodox Sunnis. And just like with any other religion, there are various denominations and sects that come up in faith traditions, and we represent Orthodox traditional Islam, which is known as the Sunni school of thought. And Dr. Esedab and Mike are, like we said, are going to be going into what Islam actually is. And I'm going to be sharing with you some of the common myths that I come across in interfaith work. I don't have time to go through all of them. The two of the most common ones that come up, I'm going to try and tackle the next 15 minutes or so. And then other myths that might come up, any other questions you might have, we can try and tackle them during QA afterwards. So the first one I wanted to talk about was, I spoke at a church in Danville and during the Q&A an elderly woman stood up and she was really upset and her voice was shaking and she said that she was really upset because Sharia had come to America and had taken over. And that now our laws and courts and judges were deciding cases based on Sharia. And she wanted me to answer that question and I didn't even know where to start with the misinformation. It was obvious that she needed to be appeased and to have her heart and mind set at rest, but it's a common misconception that comes up. And throughout history, pretty much in every culture, there's always a book event. There's always somebody who's the other and some group that's coming to take over and take away our way of life. And right now, unfortunately, Muslims are in the hot seat. My parents moved here in the 1960s and they remember it was all about the Russians. But right now it's our children who are the ones who are having to deal with these misconceptions. So that's the first myth that Sharia is coming to take over America. So I wanted to kind of demystify what Sharia is. So first and foremost, Sharia is a moral code for Muslims. Before it's a legal code, perhaps, and more than a legal code, it's a moral code. So it's more concerned with sin than it is with crime. So for example, if I were to tell a lie to my friend, there's no earthly law that's going to hold me accountable for lying to my friend. But according to Sharia, my understanding is that I will be held accountable by God for telling an untrue, for not being honest. And it's Sharia that would make me aware of that fact. And so then I realize, okay, there's steps I need to take, you know, of repentance and of changing my ways and telling the truth. So Muslims worship God with their mind, their bodies, and their souls with the heart. And Sharia is concerned with the body. It's everything to do with the physical aspect of our lives. So how we dress, how we don't dress, what we eat, what we don't eat, what we drink, what we don't drink. It's our marital relations. It's our inheritance laws. It's basically everything to do with the physical aspect of being in this world. And it tells us that what is allowed and what is forbidden. Now one thing that people may not realize is that in Islam, we are not allowed to live under an energy or chaos. Some form of government needs to be inflicted, even if it's not a Muslim one. And you need to respect the laws of the land. And so the highest law on the land in the United States of America, as of right now, is the Constitution. And so Muslims, according to Sharia, are required to respect the Constitution of the land. If they disagree with the Constitution, or if the Constitution or the laws of the land are hindering a Muslim's ability to be a Muslim, then Sharia requires that Muslims migrate. They leave that land where they're being repressed, or where they're not allowed to practice their faith. So thank God we're not there yet. And you will not find anybody who is more concerned about protecting the Constitution right now than the Muslim community. Okay, so we'll just talk about the elephant in the room. This is what people think is Sharia, and that's what they're actually asking about, even if they don't say it. And what they're asking about is what are known as penal code punishments. So they see these horrible images and videos on YouTube or on the news of the headings and cuttings and honor killings. I put it in air quotes because there's no honor in honor killings. And whippings and stonings, and they think that that is what Islam was about, but that's how we practice our lives. And first and foremost, you should know Muslims are just a battle by those videos, and Muslims are often victims of those kinds of crimes. But yes, there are penal code punishments in Islam. They make up 0.1% of the entire body of Sharia. It's a very, very nice little part. And just like the United States laws, we have capital punishment here for certain offenses. Sharia also has a formal punishment. But there's important differences between capital punishment in American law and capital punishment in Sharia. The first is that the penal code is first and foremost actually meant to be a deterrent. It's not actually meant to be implemented. And the second is that the evidence required to prove, establish proof of a punishable crime makes a punishment practically almost impossible to implement. So I'll give you the example that the penal code of punishment for adultery, according to Sharia, is death. However, the evidence required to prove that adultery has taken place is not somebody walking in a room and seeing two people under the bed covers or even seeing a pregnancy that takes place. It's actually four witnesses who've seen with their own eyes actual penetration. That's what's required to prove that adultery has taken place. So what is the point of saying that the punishment for adultery is death? The point is actually to show to the Muslim community how high the level of sin is in God's eyes. And it's a deterrent. You will stay away from something that where you're told that this is what God says is a punishment for adultery. And it's also meant to make sure that it doesn't become widespread in society, that if people are not doing anything like that it's going to be kept very, very private and really not out in the norm. Okay. The other important fact that everyone understands is that according to Sharia itself, the laws of Sharia can only be applied and upheld when there's a legitimate Muslim government in power. And the majority of the Muslim scholars today are in agreement that no such government currently exists in the world. And therefore there's no official body which has the authority to implement the upload of punishments, which like I said, only make up 0.1% of the body of Sharia law. But unfortunately when you hear the words Sharia law, people just think of this new punishment. They don't think that Sharia is the reason that we take care of our parents. That Sharia is the reason that we are respectful of our teachers. That Sharia is the reason we obey the laws of the land. In fact, I had a teacher once tell us that if you want a red light on purpose you're actually supposed to ask God to forgive you because according to Sharia you're breaking laws that you agree to follow. God is for you. So before moving on to the next myth I wanted to share with you the principles and foundations of Sharia and so we believe that all Sharia laws are divinely inspired and that they're the perfect set of laws for mankind. And if you closely study Sharia you'll find that each and every part of Sharia is meant to protect one of six values. Every Sharia rule will be protecting one of six values. And they are the first is the value of religion meaning that you can't force anyone to convert. The value of life. You can't kill anyone unjustly. The value of the family and the age. Everyone has the right to know where they come from that's why sex is confined to marriage. The value of honor. So we can't slander or backfire or lie about people. Tabular journalism is something that would not feel about under Sharia. The value of intellect and reason so that's what makes this different from the animals with the fact that we have the ability to think so that's why Muslims will not predate intoxicants, alcohol, recreational drugs. However, Sharia is nuanced. You are allowed to have as a Sharia for surgery. So there's, you know, spray air is to everything. And then the value of property so you can't steal, assert someone's wealth, cheat anyone out of what belongs to them. So those are the six values of Sharia. Alright, the second myth I'm just going to quickly cover. I was in Trigger Jokes and a woman stopped me and just started making, you know, a little chit chat and all of a sudden out of the blue she said to me, by the way, you do know to call 911 if he ever lays a hand on you, right? And I was stunned because I had no idea what she was talking about at the moment but obviously it eventually dawned on me that she was referring to another very common myth which is that women are oppressed in Islam and that women don't have rights and that they're abused. Just like any other member of the human family there are some Muslim women who are oppressed and there are some Muslim majority countries that have a culture which is oppressive to women and there are some stories of domestic violence in Muslim households. But the question everyone needs to be asking themselves is does Islam actually teach or condone or support the oppression of women? Islam actually religion that we practice. And the answer is absolutely not. The Prophet Muhammad used to be upon it. He said that the best of you are the ones who are the best to their women and the majority of the focus of his last sermon before he passed away was on the rights of women. And Muslims believe in the story of Adam and Eve just like Christians and Jews but in Islam Eve is not held accountable for Prophet Adam's mistakes. They were both held people responsible. She's not the one to blame. She's not considered to be a temptress. She's not the reason that kind of lost paradise. So that's a big thing to know about your history as a woman. Now there are a few reasons that Islam gets a bad rap. One of them is what we see on the outboard. People see the hijab, the headscarf it gets translated as a headscarf but hijab actually means barrier. It sets up boundaries for interactions between men and women. It's very visible and people often don't understand it. Unfortunately a lot of people don't see the hijab and think that the virgin Mary is the most noble woman in history according to the Muslims and Christians. They usually wonder why women have to wear it but what people don't know is that men also have parts of their bodies that they're required to cover according to Sharia just like women do. So for men they have to cover from the navel to the knees. So you won't see men wearing, Muslims men for practicing. You won't see them wearing speedos or shorty shorts or anything that's going to reveal their belly buttons. And for women who are practicing and observing the hijab they will cover everything but their hands, their face and their feet. And so why the different rules? We believe that Sharia is a divine supplier and even here in America we have different rules based on genders. So for example, if a man is jogging in the park and he gets hot and sweaty he can pull off his shirt and continue running top of us but if a woman were to do that they would be able to do so. But why? Why are the rules different for a man and for a woman? From a Muslim perspective it's the understanding that God created us and he knows best what are different women's art. The other thing that people see is in the congregational prayer they'll see women praying behind men and they'll think of it in the framework of Rosa Parks. Rosa Parks is forced to the back of the bus whenever treated like the second class citizens and that's why they're bringing it back. It actually has nothing to do with that. If you look at the Muslim prayer we stand very closely, it's very intimate shoulder to shoulder we stand, we bow we prostrate on the ground our bottoms up in the air most women would not be comfortable having a man behind them when they were in that position. So it's really more about privacy and it's about being able to focus on your relationship with God. Where you stand in the prayer has nothing to do with your closeness to God. The person in the front does not have a higher spiritual position than the person in the back. And the third reason that people get confused is really seeing what some governments are doing and the types of laws they've implemented on the female population. Salary rate is just now to change their rules. I left in 1986 I can't believe it took this long. Now in 2018 they're saying that no matter what time they're going to be allowed to drive. But the fact that women couldn't drive all that time in Saudi Arabia has nothing to do with Islam. It's got to do with the Saudi law that the Saudi government decided for their citizens. But unfortunately the holiest cities in Islam that are in the modern country of Saudi Arabia and so people automatically assume that if Saudi Arabia they think people must be like a Vatican or something. They are deciding this rule that it must be represented of all Muslims. And that's not the case. They actually don't have any legitimacy over the world's population of Muslims. So, yeah I mean I've had people say like how can you park a religion that doesn't allow women to drive? I'm not parking a religion that doesn't allow women to drive. It's the Saudi law. So I'm just going to wrap up with that. We'll talk more during Q&A. Thank you. You mentioned the human family and it's good to put that in perspective. We share almost 100% of our DNA whether you like it or not. Yes, with me, even with me. We also share something else. We share not only our Adamic father Prophet Adam, peace be upon him we also share our forefathers the forefathers that founded this country and that's something to be proud of and that's something that we associate with our reluctance for hesitation and we hope to to continue beautifying this country Amen. Amen. Amen. And it's a journey in this civilization in this world. And Muslims were in the Revolutionary War for America as history has documented the name of Bambit and Hamid who fought in the Revolution. And Muslims have been here since then. I think a quarter or a third of the slaves brought to America were Muslims building this country, establishing this country. Does anyone know the first country to recognize the existence of the United States of America? Morocco Morocco and they had the longest time treaty with the country of Muslim country America with Morocco and so that's something to know how many Muslims serve today in the U.S. Armed Forces 4,000 served today in the U.S. Armed Forces which group reports more suspicious activity to the FBI than any other group Muslims Muslims report more suspicious activity and actually an orange helmet where I used to live there was a man who was suspicious and so they called Care Council of American Armed Relations and they were like, hey there's a suspicious dude he's acting all weird so Care reported him to the FBI said there's a suspicious dude and they were like, oh sorry he's our agent they actually didn't say that at the time but eventually it came out and there were papers and they ended up suing the FBI because they used him as an agent so these are facts to be recognized less than 6% of domestic terrorism is by Muslims so why this disproportionate reputation from the last few years the statistics have come out of which groups have perpetrated the greatest terrorism it wasn't Muslims it wasn't we don't need to name any groups in this room our next panelist has the lovely task of talking about this Mike Kim is a graduate of the Naval Academy he served this country and continues now to serve in a different regard in real estate he's also a father of 7 so that's probably where he serves most and he has the lovely task of talking about this topic and he has unfortunately plastered our media and our lives in a disproportionate unnecessary manner of Jihad ISIS and etc please welcome Mike Kim I want to add one minute to what they were saying before the interconnectedness of the 3 Abrahamic faiths I just came back from that kind of Medina on a trip and I stood on the ground at Adam where he put the foundation for the first prince of worship this is all in Saudi Arabia where Prophet Jesus will be buried when he comes back we believe in the story of Richard of Christ as well Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi sallam buried then his two companions right next to him is an empty crypt where Jesus will be buried the interconnectedness are incredible the spot where Adam and Eve re-adjourned here on earth after they did what they did so this is in Saudi Arabia, back in Medina so it's really interesting how interconnected we really are so before I address the topic of ISIS and Jihad I'll do my best to do so I just want to share with you a quick background on myself and why the subject was of interest to me to give you some context so 22 some odd years ago growing up here in the Bay Area Islam was just a foreign concept I was suddenly to the mass media like everybody else I had very negative views of Islam and Muslims they were just crazy people not like us type of feelings and it wasn't until my freshman year at the Naval Academy where we were given an assignment that wasn't much of a believer either for that matter I guess I would check the box Christian on some application but I didn't really participate in religious activities but what was interesting was in my freshman year we were given an assignment to summarize the biographies of all the eminent scientists and philosophers and mathematicians in the western civilization I was in the library flipping through some books about to fall asleep but I read a passage that literally jarred me awake and it said something to the effect of how all these eminent scientists and philosophers and mathematicians were believers in a transcendental or a universal which are sanitized terms for the creator of God that really shocked me because that the most revered and widely studied and respected minds in the western civilization were believers in a God further that their lives and work were inspired by the desire to know the created universe so you know when you do Cartesian coordinates you should understand the geometric relationship in the created bodies some of the primary laws of physics by Isaac Newton were to understand origin and motion how did God begin so it just really opened up a hole in the abbey it launched me on a quest really to find out what this is all about asking the big questions so as a consequence of my inquiry in reading and debating and I think I pretty much discarded the neuro-academic curriculum and ended up reading pretty much the entire volume of the great books from Socrates, Oliver de Hume, Spinoza and St. Thomas Spanish to understand what these great minds were going after so as a consequence I think I walked with a pretty high bar on what type of religion I was going to adopt for myself because to me revelation had to really be ahead and address all of our issues and concerns and give you one example scientifically revelation to me had to be ahead of scientific discoveries and I found that to be the case in Islam where there's many scientific concepts presented in the Islam which were for many years a mystery until such time we discovered scientifically for ourselves and it was validated just one example as a navigator in the Navy the mysteries of the oceans are still perplexing to the best oceanographers and scientists today and one concept is that for example where the Mediterranean flows into the Atlantic the celebrity pressure and temperature remains distinct for many, many hours and miles and still we're starting to figure out why that is because it creates weather disturbances and it's our business to know the cross speaks about that and it speaks about it through a revelation of a desert better one prophet who's never seen the ocean so these are just one examples of why for me it made a lot of sense in the subject of combat war that was also very important to me obviously because that was the profession that I chose as an American naval officer and one thing that we learned that we teach at Annapolis at West Point is the the need for discipline and ethics in battle and the reason why is because if you don't have discipline and ethics in battle you can lose your mind you can lose your humanity and you can walk away from the battlefield permanently damaged if you don't conduct yourself in a discipline in an ethical manner so you know when I came across the idea with the Islamic jurisprudence that the means have to justify the ends and the means both need to be just it rained true because we teach at Annapolis at West Point that the way in which you conduct warfare the means have to be just as the end itself, the military goal itself it's not it's not Machiavellian where the ends justify the means we are not about that it's not about that in the American ethical concept nor is it in the Islamic so that consistency that kind of it rained true began to look into it more and what I discovered was quite fascinating because in the purpose of Islamic teaching the concept of warfare, just warfare is much more voluminous and refined and complete I found than the best of our western traditions which is an embodiment of experiences in World War II World War I the Nuremberg Trials Geneva Conventions, you name it but the Islamic body was I found much more comprehensive as I said the Quran says it states a couple of passages I think that captures it it says permission to fight is given to those against whom war is made because they have been wronged those who have been driven out from their homes unjustly, only because they said our Lord is God so fighting should be done defensively is what that statement says and the next statement is even more telling where it continues it says and if God did not repel some men by means of others they would have been pulled down by temples and churches and synagogues and mosques and notice it as a statement mosques, synagogues and churches so it is incumbent upon all of us to protect any house of worship be it a mosque, synagogue or a church so fighting is permitted for defensive purposes only and the primary means is to protect people's right to religion so that is stated in the Quran so all of this obviously was quite interesting and I continue to look more into it and Muhammad the final prophet we believe he is such a figure in Islam obviously and it was interesting because he speaks a lot about war and I found that interesting because he was a prophet, we don't necessarily know a prophet to people of war if you will but in actuality because the prophet Muhammad was the final prophet for all humanity he represents an example to us in all aspects of human existence you know be a father, teacher, student warrior, businessman you name it, he sees all of those things and leaves a rich body of work that helps us and guides us in all those aspects of human existence just to give you an example of his guidance during the times where he had to do combat, he gave very specific instructions to his troops and he said 1. Do not harm women children, elderly or the sick 2. Do not commit treachery and never violate or disfigure 3. Do not uproot cut down or burn trees 4. Do not harm any livestock except for food 5. In combat avoid striking the face of all of us in the image of Adam 6. Do not kill monks and monasteries and do not kill those sitting in places of worship 7. Do not destroy towns and villages do not spill cultivative fields and gardens so you can't starve people 8. Do not wish for an encounter with the enemy pray to God to grant you security but when you are forced to encounter them exercise patience 9. Know what they punish 10. Accuse yourself to do good people do good and do not throw excuse me even if they commit wrong that's the the means though which we conduct those are my boys where is jihad in the nicest so jihad let's talk about let's talk about mention something interesting or not like us and I think before we leave today if if we if we leave with the idea of them versus us them versus us then we still we have to leave here with a different mindset a different paradigm and you know we're not going to all have the same ideas but that's okay to discriminate against ideas is not blame worthy but to discriminate against people is so we may have different ideas and that's fine but when we leave today we have to see and I love that when Mike said it he said as an American as an American you know and we actually have more of them we have as an American and people of God because a lot of the world is losing God you know I mean when I was growing up there was something called God Blessing and it disappeared now what is it what is it bless you where did God go God is still here bless you so I actually when someone tells me bless you I'm like God bless you too God is still here like he was when I was 7 years old so we share that Godliness and my wife was actually at a seminar a writing seminar she's into writing and the person came to her and she wears the scarf and she said you know I'm just coming to you because you remind me of God even though the person wasn't listening but it's the idea of the attraction of God as being our center of gravity our pull that unites us you know so we have to be able to see and move these feathers and move these feathers and on that note our next speaker is going to help us answer that question what is Islam and Dr. Eshad is an author of the book Being Muslim a Practical Guide and I said you have Homer the artist of intimacy but you have extra credit too so this book Being Muslim a Practical Guide is a game changer it's one of the only books that's written by Muslim or an American Muslim audience that tells you what is Islam so you go to Bards and Opals but Bards and Opals doesn't exist anymore unfortunately but you go to a bookstore and you go to the religion section you find a lot of books on Islam but none of them are written by Muslims and if they are they may be a little negative so this book Being Muslim a Practical Guide is written by our our core presentation today which I will present to you we are in a position by the way thank you I want to thank everyone here for coming do you guys need a stretch break or are you guys okay? yeah good? so I'm going to try to check through I will confess my portion is a smidgen academic so it's going to be you guys got your caffeine going but I am supposed to share with you all the essence of the religion of Islam in 15 minutes I'm going to go anyways so 20 so I want to start with some definitions here so there are two terms that I want to make sure we know properly the first is the term Islam so what does Islam mean? Islam is the name of the religion itself it's an Arabic word and it comes from a word that literally means to turn oneself over to to God to surrender oneself over to and being a Semitic language it has a trilateral root system and so there are cognate words similar to the word Islam that mean peace and wholeness and other meanings similar to that so in Muslim on the other hand is the one who adheres to the religion of Islam and so sometimes you will say are you Islamic? Islam would refer to the religion so the proper question would be to argue and be Muslim now the implication by the meaning of the word itself is that a Muslim is one who surrenders themselves over to God and thereby attains to some degree of peace and wholeness in his or her life a Muslim can be from any part of the world any background as you all know because of the Christian background Jerusalem or Lebanon from all over the world various cultures here are some famous faces that everybody sort of recognizes at least a couple of those faces anybody call them out Kasteman Muhammad Ali Dr. Oz Dr. Oz has it right behind him so a Muslim can be from any particular background any culture and any race and ethnicity but one other definition I'd like to spend some time on is the word Allah and Arabic and Allah is simply the Arabic word for God it is a property for God but it's also used not just by Muslims but by Arabs who are Arab Christians or Arab Jews and in their own services we'll use the word Allah here I have an image from the book of Genesis and it says here in the beginning Allah created the heavens and the earth so what an Arab Christian would call God is simply Allah the reason that I think this needs to be said is many people like to make Allah something other than the God of Abraham and they'll use something to him and I remember I had this in work to use many of these examples I sometimes in a public setting I'll forget I'll use the word God very comfortably somebody asked me hey are you going to do such and such with this patient I said yeah I'll get to it God willing just came out and the guy looked at me and goes God I thought you'd believe in Allah and I was really confused by that comment it took me a second to say yeah it's the same thing it's just two different languages I thought you wanted water so in that sense I think it is important to sort of this demystifying to understand that we believe in the God of Abraham Noah, Isaac, Jacob Jesus, Ishmael Moses the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon them all we hold Allah to be the God that sent them all so as long sees itself it's important to understand this how does Islam view itself being other religions it's interesting scholars of religion will describe how religions view other religions and Islam sees itself as a culmination of previous religions of God that it's not that the world was in utter darkness until the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him came along but that God sent a succession of prophets the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him that says God sent a prophet to every people on earth and there were over 124,000 prophets now we don't know all of these prophets but what we would know is if we encounter a tradition like the Aloni Indians we would say that God did not leave them without guidance but at some point in time they were sent with a messenger that gave them some semblance that you were created by God you will be resurrected you should live according to it some version of that so what Muslims would say is that truth is out there and Islam is simply the complete culmination of all of that and so sometimes you will hear Muslims talk about Islam with a lower case high and here I have that distinction for a reason because if you look at the Oronic narrative or the Oran being the Holy Book of Muslims you will see many phrases like Abraham saying I am the first of the Muslims or Moses saying I am a Muslim and if you read that you will say wait but they were born millennia centuries before the Prophet Muhammad how were they Muslims what we would say is Muslims in the sense of surrendering over to God the generic form of Islam that all of these religions were surrendering to God if you were on the Ark with Noah you were surrendered to God if you did get on the Ark and said I don't believe that anything is coming then you rejected God's message so in that sense we believe in a lower case bias on the permeates other faith traditions as well there is a famous statement of the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him that I think illustrates this beautifully where he says to paraphrase that God's message to humanity is like a beautiful building and people are walking around saying what a beautiful building what a beautiful structure except it's just missing one brick and he said I am that final brick so the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him doesn't see his mission as replacing the work of his predecessors Jesus and Moses and Ishmael he sees it as completing and continuing to really understand the religion of Islam so now we've talked about some definitions how it fits in with other religions I want to talk about the essence of the religion and these are the quiz at the end of this talk will be on these three things here faith, conduct and character these are the three dimensions of the religion of Islam so I am going to go through them conduct which our sister Hanna already referred to these are the bodily dimension of being a human being these are the actions in our lives so God calls upon us to do certain things and abstain from other things so Muslims have five main devotions but who here is one of the five pillars of Islam do I show hands almost half the five pillars are referred to the five pillars of conduct but if you really want to know a basic framework for Islam it's the faith, conduct and character so for conduct the first is that a Muslim has to believe in and state these two testimonies that I testified that there's nothing worthy of worship save God this is what's called radical monotheism to reject all other things whether idols of the heart or idols in reality that divinity is one and that Muhammad please be funny he's a final messenger of God we'll talk a little bit more about that later we have five daily prayers these aren't prayers in the sense of asking God for things these are ritual devotions five times during our day regardless of how busy we are we try to take out several minutes to sit down and to worship God out of gratitude the third is a purified charity that anybody who is above a certain poverty line is to give one 40th of their excess and unused all through the year so it's not tax on your income but it's your savings so if you have over a year $40,000 that you didn't have to use for your family that one out of that 40 should be given to the need the fourth is fasting a month called Ramadan this is 30 days in which Muslims fast from the break of dawn until sunset of stating from food to drink and intimacy and when after sunset it's permitted to eat again and go back to a normal existence so the fifth is Pilgrimage this is a city that might be referring to the holy city of Mecca and it's mentioned in the Old Testament as Becca would it be so that sometimes it changed its name historically over time Becca so making Pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca founded by Ishmael Abraham there's one of the outer line tabernacles for the religious that they would visit but this is where a Muslim must perform Pilgrimage at least once in their lifetime so these are the five basic devotions that every Muslim if they're able to have to adhere to and this is conduct faith so Muslims obviously being a religion they have things that they believe in faith things that we believe in are things that we do these are truths that we hold in our minds so the first is to believe in God the second is that we believe in angels that God has these intermediaries that communicate with and act upon the world conducting his will we believe that they don't have free will but they are beings that are they're real in existence that God sends scripture so that there is divine revelation to humanity through these angels and through their prophets we affirm the divine origin of the Torah the Psalms, the gospel and the whole line to be the final revelation and then we believe in messengers that God, and we talked about this briefly that God sends people to their respective communities to tell them about God so one sort of note worth mentioning here is that for Muslims Jesus is a prophet you may have heard me sort of allude to that so Muslims will say that he was born of a virgin birth, he was the messiah he will return at the end times but then he was the son of God in the metaphorical sense that he was God's lead but not God the son in a literal sense so probably closer to earthly humanitarian views of Jesus and that he was a prophet who will sort of return and as Mike sort of alluded to a dire mortal death and then the day of judgment that we believe that all of us will be resurrected and we held accountable for our moral responsibility, the things that we do in the world have a real meaning and that nobody gets away with anything even if we think they get away with it and the final sixth object of faith that we hold is that we believe in what's called divine decree that nothing happens in the cosmos outside of God's design so to speak and so that everything is that's happening according to his will so before I get to the third dimension, it's a faith conduct in characters, we talked about faith in conduct, I want to talk a little bit about the Islamic understanding of what it means to be human so there are two dimensions worth mentioning here the first is that we believe that our souls have a primary nature, each of us, the soul that God created has an innate knowledge of right and wrong an innate love of everything that is beautiful, there's a reason that if you're a healthy person and you see like a baby who can resist smiling back at that, unless your primary nature has been disturbed for some reason there's a reason we all love sunsets we can appreciate the beauty of nature and that nothing that man makes that beautiful architectural structure still pales in comparison to a beautiful mountain range or the Grand Canyon that's because of our primary nature our souls see something they see God's fingerprints metaphorically on that and so that's our primary nature at the same time and we all know this if we're honest with ourselves we still have a selfish side of ourselves the ego and this is a part of us that the result of being in a corporal realm that once the soul is put into the body develops its ego that has a capacity, even a thirst for fulfilling its passions and its desires its covenants, it's generous it can be vengeful when it sees itself wrong so when we come to the dimension of character the primary process is for a Muslim to engage in what's called the purification of the soul so this is a spiritual exercise by which, and I think this is universal to almost all religions by which we have to purge these tendencies of the ego, the selfishness the hatred, the jealousy, the envy all of these things just purge them and we have to nurture and adorn ourselves with the soul's true nature which is to love God and to love neighbor and to be given to be sacrificed and to be altruistic and all of these things that religion commands us to listen to the better angels of ourselves and also in alignment with that part of developing character is to live a life that is centered on God and heaven in one sense what does that mean, what that means Muslims have a type of asceticism and this is not an asceticism like some of the early Christian monks who retreat and leave society very difficult sort of spiritual tasks at hand there this is an asceticism that all of us are to go down so it's to be in the world without being of the world without being worldly that we can be here but know that this is a temporary bus stop and that we're going to go to the next station soon enough and what that means is that when we there's that bumper sticker kind of line where you're supposed to love people and use things but unfortunately use things and that we love things and use people that a Muslim asceticism is to see that this world is simply matter in the hand and it should work its way into the heart should be in the heart are those noble things loving God and your neighbor and and so to read it all together just a sort of recap Islam and its three dimensions of what is it faith, conduct, character is seen as a reaffirmation of all previous religious traditions and by surrendering to God through our minds that's the faith what we believe in our bodies in terms of moral and upright conduct and with our souls developing more purified character virtuous character that we will bring peace and harmony both to ourselves but also to our families and into society at large Islam is sometimes referred to in the middle road that in religion these paths tend to take can take one or two extremes sort of on the spectrum to use Aristotle's golden need that it can either become it can either have the law and to the exclusion of the spirit or it can have spirit to the exclusion of law, Islam calls for a marriage of law and spirit in which the rich legal teachings of the Torah and the spirituality of the gospel are merged in this the faith, conduct and character of a Muslim so here again is sort of a summary of all of this on and slight off thank you for your attention and if you have left lots out if you have questions thank you so we're going to continue with Mike's segment and we'll put it at the first part of the Q&A we're going to do a Q&A session after our small stretch break however before that I want to say that that's for the last my teacher and role model Sarah Kim Sarah Kim is a mother of seven I have three actually and my wife my wife's name is Amida which means princess she takes that very seriously so Sarah is going to share with us how to balance being Muslim and American and how we can successfully intertwine that and beautifully please welcome Sarah Kim for about 18 years and before that I was born raised and went to college on the east coast and as I think mentioned we have seven children I have six sons and one daughter it's really important that I start by thanking you I know the other panelists have done that as well but it's from my heart that I thank you for being here to assemble this panel all we want we can practice what we want to say and have meetings and whatnot but it doesn't matter if nobody shows up to listen to us I really just from my heart love and thank you for coming and spending time on your valuable weekend to come listen to us and learn about us I'd like to believe that we're all here today because we love our community we love our country we love our world we know that if we seek to understand and respect one another we actually can elevate ourselves and our respective communities and our beloved country to the highest possible levels so the title of my talk is how Islam made me a better American but what does that really mean to be an American there are likely many definitions for this however I am confident that there are a set of ideals which were made with most Americans compassion integrity mutual respect kindness generosity equality these are all things that I think good human beings good Americans would strive to embody and what I would like to speak today about is a topic that I can address but what I hope is a sincere and passionate heart and that is the topic of racism growing up I was very close to my maternal grandparents I would spend summers in North Carolina with them and since I was an early riser like my grandfather we would enjoy a daily 7am breakfast at a restaurant nestled at the bottom of the mountain where he lived I was proclaimed his favorite granddaughter partially because I was named after his eldest daughter Sarah Jo who passed away in a tragic car accident the year before I was born and apparently I looked like Sarah Jo as well so his affinity toward me was clear and understandable to all and in return I deeply loved and adored him as well he was a generous man he was always showering love and affection on all of us but there was one thing that I remembered not knowing how to love about him and that was his deep-seated racism and hatred for people of color he openly insulted and disrespected black people he frequently used the N word I remember being very uncomfortable with his attitude and actions towards blacks so naturally I exonerated myself from being racist in hindsight however I realized that the post civil rights era in the south was still right with unspoken racism though there were African Americans in the town where I lived and in the school that I attended we had very little to do with one another I didn't have any black friends I didn't live near black people I didn't sit near black people in class or at lunch basically there was minimal to know interaction between them and us separate but equal may have been damaged by law but it was alive and well in everyday actions even in mine in my mind however I was all American as apple pie a blonde haired blue-eyed high school cheerleader my European ancestors landed on American shores in the early days of settlement my mother is part Native American I lived in southern suburbia I was the daughter of a self-made businessman attending some of the best public schools in the area along with church on Sundays and I had my mind set to wear the unattended service academy after graduation so who could possibly be more American than me in 1996 I had completed a couple of years at the US Naval Academy before realizing that military life actually was not for me I transferred to the University of Maryland to get my degree in civil engineering I was with Mike and had our first son Ben Mike was still in the Navy and stationed in Japan and I stayed in the States to finish my degree and it was at that time that I was introduced to Islam since my talk is not about my conversion story I won't go into much detail about how I chose to enter into this religion but I do want to share with you how becoming Muslim completely altered my understanding of race before I do that however this would be an appropriate time to share a few of the Islamic teachings regarding race which come to us via sayings from our prophet Muhammad peace be upon them or verses taken from our holy book the Quran which we believe to be the direct word of God as I share these with you please keep in mind the opening lines of the preamble of the declaration of independence the document that forms the foundation of our nation we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal in Islam we are taught the same we are taught that righteousness is the only quality that makes someone virtuous in sight of God not race or skin color or lineage or the country that one comes from in his last and final public sermon to the Muslims over 1400 years ago the prophet Muhammad peace be upon him very clearly addressed his talk of the phrases in what he said oh people your lord is one and your father Adam is one there is no favoritism of an Arab over a non-Arab or a non-Arab over an Arab neither red skin over black skin or black skin over red skin except through righteousness we were also taught by the prophet Muhammad peace be upon him that God created Adam from handfuls of clay and dirt collected from the different areas of the earth so just as the dirt of the earth is different colors we have black soil white sand red clay the children of Adam come in different colors as well finally he taught us there is no good in red skin or black skin but our value lies only in our righteousness and in our closeness to God so these are some of the teachings of Islam that slowly began to permeate my life and to help me develop a deeper understanding of the problems with racism however there was one crucial time in my life that these teachings really took hold of me and taught me the true essence of what it meant to be an American my father at the age of 50 was diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor and given two months to live I wanted to take my young son Ben back home with me to South Carolina so that I could take care of my father in his final days he readily agreed to have me come home but firmly warned me against trying to convert him to my new religion I had become Muslim only three months prior I assured him I would do no such thing and I headed to South Carolina interestingly enough in a short period of time after quietly observing me in my worship and noting my newfound mindfulness that had brought to my day to day life my father began questioning me about my new faith facing death he was forced to think about his own mortality so he started seeking answers to the questions of what might be coming after death and what had been the real purpose of his life I tried my best to answer his questions but my own limited knowledge of my new religion couldn't satiate his deep curiosity he peppered me with questions and answers in desperation to provide him with what he was looking for I searched for a local Muslim community where I might be able to find someone that he could speak to someone who could answer his questions anyone who could give him the answer that I simply could not provide I searched in the phone book I asked around nothing I could find no Muslims anywhere near us I was desperate for nights I prayed to God though I didn't know everything about Islam I didn't know that one of the irrefutable tenants of the religion is that one condition of prayer is that you have to recognize and submit to the nods that only God has the power to answer your prayer and answer it he did one morning my father stumbled across an ad in the local newspaper announcing the grand opening of an Islamic center in the very next town he eagerly showed it to me and I couldn't believe my eyes it was truly a miracle God had sent us some Muslims that very next Saturday we drove to Rockville, South Carolina to meet those Muslims in the hopes that they would help my father settle the affairs of the soul to my surprise and honestly to my very deep disappointment we saw that the entire group was comprised of African-Americans not one other white person was in the room my heart sank certain that this was a mistake deep down I knew that there was no way my father could be guided to a new belief system through a group of African-Americans it just wasn't possible he had been conditioned all of his life to hate them but another fact that we are taught in Islam God is greater what you often hear as a law of Hecobot God is greater than all the limitations that we place upon ourselves and the limitations we place upon others for in fact when my father emerged from that center he was a man deeply moved by all those whom he had met he was a man who received the answers to the questions that had remained unanswered for so long and he was now a man of the Muslim faith God is truly greater than anything we can imagine through the words and the actions and the sincerity of those whom he had been room to hate he had found acceptance love and a faith that he would embrace and then practice and a means of drawing closer to his creator until his death almost one year later may God have mercy on him this is something Muslims say about those who have passed similar to what people say God rest his soul or make him rest in peace the Black Muslim community in South Carolina took very good care of my dad and me they would invite us to their homes every Friday after the congregational prayers my father would be with the men and I would hang out with all the women and the children the men became an unwavering web of support for my father teaching him guiding him and helping to come to terms with his impending death while I was comforted by and thrilled by the peace that my father had found this was actually a momentous turning point for me as well for the first time in my life I had black friends they were more than friends to me however they were my sisters we would pray together sing together eat together and laugh together it was a beautiful and memorable time in my life it was a Friday in February nearly one year after my dad's conversion to Islam when he returned to his lord at the time of his casting my two year old son Ben an African American brother named Abdullah and I were all sitting at his bedside by the way Muslim women often refer to Muslim men as brothers and men often refer to Muslim women as sisters out of respect anyway this brother had come to visit my father so that he could read from the Holy Quran and his presence Muslims believe that the recitation of the Quranic words in Arabic brings solace to the heart and specifically the reading of the chapter called Yasin helps to ease the souls passing from this world to the next so it was through the lips of this black man that these verses aided my father's soul and it was the brothers from this black community who came to pick up his body and it was they who washed his head and his limbs who perfumed him who shrouded him and prepared him for his burial they arranged for his funeral transported his coffin to the cemetery lowered his body into the ground and then prayed over him in accordance with the Islamic rituals of burial there were rows and rows of black men praying for my father's soul if only my grandfather had been there to witness that tremendous and powerfully ironic scene so that was the starting point from which all my unrealized racism started to melt away it was at this point that I became truly Muslim and truly American I understood the power of humanity without preconceived notions or discriminatory entertainings and upon moving to California I have continued to be blessed with the most amazing friends and community members from all backgrounds races and religions it is on this premise a mutual respect for all of God's creation that I have found a true kinship with all races and all people I have been taught that to treat everyone with dignity and respect is an active worship because of our faith my life and my husband's life and my children's lives have been elevated and I hope and pray that we will always be positive contributors to the greater society in which we live I can surely say with immense gratitude and humility that I have a better human being and a better American for it it is my sincerest wish that my children along with all of the children of our Muslim communities will lead future generations of Americans based on the premise of God's command to get to know one another in peace and to respect and to create a life that uplifts all that is good and suppresses all that is equal thank you for taking the time to get to know all of us and for honoring me by listening to my story I sincerely pray that this afternoon is just the beginning of a wonderful new friendship by the way sorry Muslims next door naval officer ranch manager principal and ER physician lawyer, mother and father husband these are the Muslims next door so no need to fear anymore don't be scared no dogs, neat girls or Mexicans Jews not allowed Irish need not applied caution, beware of nations moving, this is a white man's neighborhood these are some of the realities of the history of our nation and today it's the turn, it's the Muslims turn it's the Muslims turn but hopefully it's a phase that with these acts of beauty that you guys have done today in our competition of beauty that we will overcome this time in our history so we're going to take a short break it's four we're going to take a little break and there are some sweets to enjoy and there's also some cards so prepare if you have any questions there are cards there please be true and raw and authentic and make this meaningful write any questions you have and have some up or we'll collect them bringing right up here my daughter and Dr. Esau's daughter you guys want to walk around and collect the cards in a few minutes and then we'll reconvene at 410 with the ending continuation of Mike's ideas related to jihad and ISIS thank you so in Islam jihad has a root word of jif which means to make an effort and struggle with your internal ego so it's this impression it's that irascible soul that we all contend with so all of you in this room are performing jihad that's the meaning of the word that's the greater jihad and by way of example the Prophet Muhammad was asked by a young man who asked to join the military and the Prophet peace be upon him said perform jihad by serving your parents so that's the greater jihad you have the ability to serve your parents in another example the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him said the best jihad is to speak truth to a tyrannical leader so those are just a couple of examples of the greater jihad the lesser jihad does contain military warfare which I've discussed earlier some of the conditions of military warfare in jihad that I think are interesting is that you have to be attacked for defensive purposes only you can only be declared by a legitimate authority or ruler so for ISIS for example they don't have a nation state so by definition they cannot perform warfare organized warfare because they don't have an organized a nation or governmental structure they were desperately trying to form one but thankfully they failed or are failing okay so that's jihad religiously everybody every Muslim is required to perform the greater jihad which is to struggle with oneself but not everyone is required to perform the lesser jihad which is the warfare component so there are strict criteria for which you can perform in military campaigns okay ISIS so ISIS is a condition that were born out of a power vacuum in the Middle East a large part created by us in the United States we left Syria and Iraq and Afghanistan with their infrastructure security apparatus completely decimated and nefarious regimes filled that power vacuum I suppose it would be no different than if Russia were to theoretically take over the United States destroy our military apparatus and security system and leave who would fill that power vacuum my guess is probably the Mississippi militia people with weapons and then somebody China would be calling them terrorists I guess so anyways that's ISIS we don't believe in vigilante justice and that's what they do with their vigilantes they're outside of Islam they have no legitimacy in the eyes of Muslims they kill more Muslims than they do with anybody else so we have no affinity, no relations to their theology, their brand of whatever I guess the best way to describe it is that maybe the KKK is the Christianity what ISIS is to Islam so it's an aberration so I took the two most difficult questions I gave the rest to our panel and so this one says this question is for this should go to Mahdi Amin I love you I think it's from my daughter I also took this one this should go to Esad Tarsin it says I love you from his son so that's my part give you guys the rest ok so I'm going to take one question here with the love you have peace and kindness how does it get turned into hatred of America and everything we stand for it's a great question it's a great, great, great, great question the first thing I do is challenge the perception is much greater than the reality the perception is much greater than the reality so for example if you look at the numbers related to terrorism Muslims historically and even in modern times conduct closer to the lower amount of terrorism however they get the most attention so that's an anomaly that's an absurdity disproportionate so the numbers themselves if you look at them they're misrepresented so if you wanted to for example take that amount of attention that the media gives to each ethnic group that conducts terrorism there would be a lot of other groups that get a lot more attention Muslims if you do that comparison Muslims get about a thousand something I did the math before a thousand something more attention than they should if you do the ratio the time given in the media versus the actual numbers according to the FBI Muslims conducted less than 6% of domestic terrorism so that's number one that's the challenge number two I would say that I think actually most of the world loves most of the Muslim world loves America and I would say metaphorically and figuratively worships America most of them want to be American want to be American when I used to travel abroad you're from America oh can you tell me a word in English and I'm like yeah and they're like do you know this word guess what word they say they say all the bad words can you say that word no no no I'm not going to say that word no thank you I would say attachment to being American so I push back a little in that second sense and say that most people actually love love America so that's number two the third, acknowledging the reality of why there is there is ill feelings it's politically motivated politically motivated and so for political reasons whether they are hostile ignorant Muslims and there are many of them who are imbalanced and their anger controls them instead of their their sage you know their inner dog controls them instead of their inner intellect their king their minister so there's imbalance and so it's politically motivated and it's not going to be a religious motivation my yeah I'll conclude with that let's pass it to the next one. Just a footnote to Matthew's which is you know I think sometimes Muslims are seen as solely a product of their religion without any humanity to them sometimes right so it's like oh why are Muslims bad drivers it must be some person the far on right sometimes many of the things that happen are simply human nature right us versus them is as old as humanity itself goes back to Cain and Abel right and I think most of the hatred you can see between any two peoples is the ego and Satan getting the better of those people and I don't think it's that much more to it I believe because if you read most people's scriptures and their teachings they'll say yeah I know I should be patient and forgiving it but do you know what he just did to me right and it allows them to fall into conflict so I would simply say falling into us versus them conflict and demonizing the other is far more a human capacity than it is to any particular religion or teaching and in my estimation I got a couple of I hope quick answers to tough questions to people asking what's the difference between Sunni and Shiite sects of Islam simply put I would say they are very similar for the most part but the distinction came after the death of the Prophet Muhammad when there were questions about succession and what role his family would play and these sort of political and spiritual questions turned into theological ones and they sort of coalesced over time to theological positions so some of the main sort of features would be coming to believe that the lineage of the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him should be political leaders that would be the Shiite tradition so they have almost an overlap between spiritual and political leadership whereas the Sunni Orthodox school and Orthodox is a problematic word because nobody ever says that they are heterodox right every the Sunni Shiites see themselves as Orthodox as well so but the Sunni school which is which is commonly translated as Orthodox viewed that succession to the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him politically was something that was agreed upon by the community and you know a different process rather than than lineage or spiritual status so but like I said roughly you know they all read from the same portal on the same five pillars they pray the fast etc so all in all I would say that they're the same and it's on the same card so I'm just kind of what is the purpose of fasting in Ramadan the purpose of fasting it's interesting the verse in the Quran that that brings the the command to fast actually says that fasting is prescribed for you just as it was prescribed for those who came before you and in the commentary it says that the Jews of the Christians were prescribed fasting so fasting is an Abrahamic devotion and it's first and foremost a devotion to God you know it's almost like asking you know why were there sacrifices or what they are they are to show to gain nearness to God but there's also a benefit to fasting and I would say that fasting is a spiritual exercise in which the ego is tamed right food drink and intimacy are some of the most instinctive desires that we have and if we can put those in check right for just 12 hours a day right 30 days a year at minimum then we will have at least exercise our spiritual muscles to simply refrain and start to know what it means to control the desire and impulse the cup of water is right here but I'm choosing not to drink it I'm restraining myself and that self restraint has to carry over into other aspects of our lives one of the interesting things is the word incontinence which is now almost always used medically meant in if you look at medieval literature is anybody know what incontinence meant for them the inability to control desire right so when somebody would you know fall into adultery the conceptualization was it could withhold themselves from a desire that they had right they've never helped they've never pulled the reins back on that horse right and so the definitely fasting has that as a spiritual exercise is to withhold from you know the most basic human instincts to gain some discipline in a nutshell somebody's asking my daughter has made several close Muslim friends at school summer refugees and maybe that changes some things but as a mom I've had difficulties getting on the same wavelength with the other moms are there any particular cultural difficulties that come into play with play dates I totally understand like both sides of the issue because I remember as a child my mom having anxiety about me going to people's homes where they didn't understand our faith or didn't practice it and what social situations I may be put into that would make me uncomfortable and I think what's really important is having a conversation in maybe explaining that you are willing to hear about what may be limits for some child who's coming to your home and I'll give you an example my son told me about a conversation he had with a friend in high school wanted him to come for a party at his home the dinner party and my son mentioned to me that he said no to the dinner invitation and I asked him why and he said the conversation like that his friend said why won't you come it's not like a party where it's guys and girls partying if my parents are going to be there it's a dinner that I'm inviting me to and you're not going to have alcohol because he knew that my son doesn't drink alcohol for Muslims they would be very practicing Muslims would be very uncomfortable and my son said yeah but you guys are planning to play poker right and he was like yeah what's wrong with that they were a poker game the friends in the family and my son said I don't gamble so what I explained to my son was you know it would have been good to have that conversation with your friend explaining to him that these are the things that would make it uncomfortable for me in a social situation and your friend sounds very sincere and willing to do what it takes to make it comfortable for you and these conversations are important to have so I would you know there may be language barriers obviously and coming to a new country people have all kinds of fears when they come they may have been told by people back home that beware of this and beware of that and there's stereotypes about people who are not Muslim just like people have about Muslims as well so it would be important to just have a conversation about what what would it be that would make it comfortable for your child to have a play date with my child and sometimes it can't it can be nuanced you know like and so that that'll lead me to the other question somebody asked is I was in Egypt with my brother and a young Egyptian woman who was our guide I needed to get her attention and I put my hand on her shoulder but then I feared I had acted inappropriately what's the proper way for a non-Muslim man to interact like that is all touch inappropriate it's a very very sensitive question and it's things like that that do make some people uncomfortable about having to constantly explain why they do or don't do something so for a practicing Muslim woman who is observing the limits of her religion that have been talked to her yes physical touch between men and women would be inappropriate so oftentimes when I speak in churches and temples when I speak on my own I ask them to even make an announcement or let the congregation know ahead of time that I'm not comfortable hugging men or shaking hands with men I prefer the proper way to read a woman is to put your hand on your chest and say hello and so if you look at those etiquette manuals that they used to have here even in the 60s the 50s of the 60s they they said that when you shake hands with a woman up here in the West it was the proper etiquette was to wait for the woman to extend her hand if she extended her hand then gentlemen would wait and so that would that's the advice I would give for anyone who's curious about interacting with Muslim women because what Muslim women there's the entire spectrum there will be women will have no problem giving a hug and shake whatever but I would wait to see how she decides to interact first and I will pass so the question I have is the Torah and Psalms apart from the Quran no it's not a part of the Quran the way we view the earlier scriptures is we believe that they existed and that they were inspired by God and we respect them but we don't use them now to legislate our guidance and then the second question was what role do angels play in our lives so we believe that angels inspire good deeds and they basically are God's workers and they don't have the ability to disobey they just do God's bidding basically so they have many different kinds of jobs some that would affect us like on a regular basis we believe that we have scribes angels that since our right shoulder our left shoulder writes down all the good things that we do the bad things that we do we believe that angels bring revelation that they're involved with death and they take the soul of the the human being when it's time for them to pass and we believe in guardian angels we believe in for our angels Mikhail is Israel is Michael is really as real and Israel Gabriel Gabriel is the archangel who has brought revelation so when we learned about prophet Muhammad receiving revelation it was through angel Gabriel and Israel will blow the trumpet judgment okay so the angel of death who will take the souls and and then and then we also have you know believe like every drop of rain that falls from the sky has an angel with it so just angels are everywhere doing all kinds of different things and they're made from light that's what I was a study that is a junior college it's the it's the first accredited Muslim liberal arts college in America it's in Berkeley California first in the Western hemisphere actually and so after practicing law for seven years I won't study there and graduated in 2014 and I learned something while studying Sharia in my Islamic law class and I was like wow and so when we when Muslims pray they wash before the prayer and it's called being in a state of ritual purity so it's called an ablution or a lustration but in other words Muslim washes their hands arms face wipes their head washes their feet that's why you might sometimes see a Muslim their feet in the sink and you're like what is he doing right that's what they're doing they're trying to be closer to that so in that class they they I was taught that Muslim is gets reward if before they hold an Old Testament or New Testament they are in a state of ritual washing they're in the state of ablution in other words to honor those old texts you know so that's what I learned studying Sharia honor the Old Testament and I get rewarded by honoring it and to honor the New Testament I get rewarded by honoring it and being in a state of purity big five world religions have had violent extremist but it seems Islam has had more than others so I presume the other five meaning Judaism Christian Islam Hindu and Buddhist is what I'm assuming and true they all have their share of extremist but the notion that Islam has more is patently false I'll give you one example yeah well first I'll look to say you know it just takes a casual moment of logic to know that there's 1.7 billion Muslims in the world which is like one in four human beings so if a quarter of humanity has issues and you know this is a pretty devastatingly tragic world right when we say Timothy McVeigh Las Vegas shooter the church shooting in the south Jeffrey Dahmer unabomber etc etc countless school shootings what we don't say is we don't say white Christian terrorists imagine if we did boy be a long list be a lot of dead people white Christian terrorists yet however when there is someone who create who causes death and carnage and that person happens you Muslim is always Muslim terrorists always so the problem is is labeling to large extent and you know it is all part of this notion of a policy of fear when we are blanketed with these fearful and fear of mongering media and political views of what have you then the only consequences paralysis intellectual paralysis it doesn't allow us to be critical and ask that great fundamental question why don't we use eternal white Christian terrorists for all these people because they're all white Christians but why do they all of them Muslim terrorists see so we can't have to remove that dark cloud of fear above our heads so we can start to think critically I think that's part of our obligation the other question is is there a religious reason for so much extremism or is it more due to society struggling with poverty and lack of education I think poverty I'm not a socialist as I don't know the technical answers and statistics but I would assume that poverty has a lot to do with a lot of apparent behavior in different communities in society that actually saw firsthand when I was in the Navy traveling on the world in these very desperate places and you know it takes a certain degree of economic stability to live an honorable life where you don't steal cheap right but when you can't happy when you love the basics to feed your family then you know what is a higher moral standard right to steal bread to feed your children or not so it's it's it's relativistic to some degree and I think you know poverty and lack of education has its role in creating disturbances in society but a religious reason for so much extremism I would say no I don't see textually anywhere in Islam in the Quran that was sanctioned any of these violent acts that are happening in fact I would attribute it to more for political reasons history has shown that under the banner of nationalism and religious fervor you can get a lot of people moving in some particular political direction you want them to move and you know we if you study these movements you see that these leaders are actually doing that they're using political their political reasons are fueled by their nationalism or their religious fervor to get the people to start following that and you know let's not be naive I mean we are right in the middle of this nationalism movement whether here in the US or in Europe so we really do need to guard ourselves against that and not allow the nationalistic fervor to blind us into making you know foolish policies so I'm sorry for pontificating but the next question I have is what do you believe happens after the resurrection there's a long very detailed answer for this that I don't know so I'm just going to keep it really simple so all we believe that the angel will blow the trumpet and it will be the day of judgment and all people from all times will be gathered and there will be a judgment in front of God and we believe in a scale where your good deeds and your bad deeds will be weighed and God will judge whether you're someone going to paradise or to the hellfire and ultimately while there is a scale and there is a concept of good deeds versus bad deeds we mostly rely on God's mercy and that none of us actually earn paradise but it's through God's mercy that we will hopefully make it there and the next question is do you believe in an afterlife absolutely we do and do all worthy Muslims qualify for heaven again anyone who gets in the heaven we believe is purely on God's mercy and that having faith in God is a prerequisite to enter heaven but not a guarantee to just circle back really quickly to the question about play dates just to give a little bit more detail about what a parent could do to make it more comfortable for a Muslim child to come over if you were going to have that conversation with a parent making it clear that you're willing to give the child space and privacy to complete their prayers because we have five prayers a day and prayer time comes in and sometimes parents or children don't know how to explain that they need to use the restroom to wash up and they need a private spot in the house where they can go say their prayer and rather than having that uncomfortable conversation people will just say that can't come for a play date you know so if you can say look I know that prayer time is important we'll facilitate that and also making sure that any need that you serve to Muslim children would be hello which is very easy to get many whole stores here in the Bay Area and yeah those those are probably the key things that parents worry about media I want to respect time we're a little over so that is just a preface that I'm going to use this next one 30 seconds I thought that it's brief but it's in the interest of trying to respect the whole group's time so this question says I've been interested in studying the Quran because it is such an important book but much like the Bible I find it a little tedious and boring can you recommend a study guide or a class or online resource to provide structure to my study to keep me motivated I have a couple resources that I don't I will keep it brief there's a book by Gary wills called what the Quran meant and why it matters that's more of a sort of bird's-eye view and I think if you have that in place will make your study easier there's also it's easy to remember it's called the study Quran the study Quran it'll help you to study the Quran it is it's actually a great piece of scholarship and I think that'll give you what you need do we have any other questions or are we if we did not answer any questions because of time how we want to honor that so please do feel free to reach out via Facebook or email when he was right there we do want to honor them and so so please some of us will hang around some of us might have to go but if we didn't just please do come up so we can answer that question I was I was in my law practicing law one time and we were invited to you know enjoy a Lakers game because I used to practice down south and we had a nice box you know and I went to the game and then we enjoyed the game and then I had to pray so so I was gonna get a break so you know I left the nice comfy box and and then I went in the hallway stadium and there was this little crevice area you know it's corner so I went break it and then and then these people were walking by see okay I was prostrating and then one guy's like I think he needs another rear and then they started taking pictures of me so I'm gonna conclude with just a small prayer and it's a in this prayer interestingly this is what Muslims recite at a bare minimum for Muslim praise five times a day they recite this prayer in every unit of prayer and it's the opening chapter of the Quran it's called the opening it's chapter one of the Quran just a few verses and in this chapter we refer to God's mercy four times four times and four times 17 is 68 68 so a Muslim is a person of mercy and if they don't understand that they don't understand Islam as God says my mercy surpasses my anger so God's prevailing attribute is mercy God's prevailing attribute is mercy and likewise for Muslim and so it's this this is a prayer and it's a supplication as well I'm gonna recite it in Arabic and what it means is in the name of God the source of mercy the giver of mercy all praise is due to God Lord of the worlds the source of mercy the giver of mercy master of the day of judgment it is you we worship it is you we seek help from guide us to the straight path the path of those whom you have favored not of those who have went astray who have earned your anger who have went astray amen so that's the translation in English and I'm gonna just recite a small prayer in Arabic Bismillahirrahmanirrahim Alhamdulillahirrahmanirrahim Rewarded over here to gather us all in his heaven and to take care of our worldly needs and our afterlife needs and to restore harmony and tranquility peace and love to restore all of that in our marriages and our families and our homes and our schools and our governments in our world and it's not difficult for God and we ask God to use us as envoys of beauty as vessels of peace to wherever we go you reach miles to people and we help people with their needs as we traverse in this realm of difficulty called life we ask God to make it easy for us and for others we ask God to bless your community to bless this community to bless our nation to bless our world I mean I mean I mean we ask him to send peace and blessings and mercy on all the messengers and all the prophets and all praise is due to you God I mean thank you very much for having us here remember we're all world links what are we world links Muslim tradition perspective and one day hopefully we'll all be reunited in our true home I mean thank you very much again to this beautiful community this gymnasium is gorgeous serious