 So my task is that within the next 10 minutes I'm going to give you an overview of the religion of Islam. Yeah, 20. So a little bit of breathing. So what I'd like to do is hopefully give you an overview on a conceptual level, not getting down into specifics, but more giving you a bird's eye view to sort of look at what the box of the puzzle shows you that image, because sometimes we can look at individual pieces and lose sight of what the whole thing is. So that's my hope here today. So first I'd like to start with some definitions. So first two, what is the term Islam? So Islam is the proper name of the religion itself. Yeah, I am. I'm going to stand just because I kind of need to see this line back. With your permission. It's the proper name of the religion itself. So it's a word that means literally to turn oneself over to. It is to surrender over to. And it means obviously to surrender oneself over to God. So Islam is therefore one who has surrendered himself or herself over to God. It's one who achieves and the word Islam also comes from a root word that means peace. So you sometimes might have heard that phrase where some people say Islam actually means peace. Yeah, the word Salam and even the Hebrew Shalom and Semitic languages means peace. And so what it means is that when a person surrenders him or herself over to God, they attain peace within themselves and are able to emanate that peace throughout the world, hopefully. But a Muslim is not a person of any specific race or ethnicity. They're people from all walks of life. There's Muslims of every ethnicity on earth. And I've got some pictures up here to sort of illustrate that. Some sort of more famous and well-known people. But there's anybody... The first one I think is probably one of the most recognizable faces in modern history. But Muhammad Ali, who we all know of, an American Muslim who just passed away just a few years ago. Cat Stevens, who converted and took on the name Yusuf Islam. And then Dr. Azir. Many famous athletes and many people that we know that we may not know are Muslim. But it doesn't necessitate any particular race or ethnicity. It's just one who surrenders himself over to God. Another definition I think is important to consider is the word Allah. Who is Allah? What does that mean? Is that a deity that Muslims worship? Muslims, it is simply the Arabic name for God, the God of Abraham. In the Qur'an, you will see that the returning point for all conversations, particularly with Jews and Christians, is Abraham. Abraham is considered the father of monotheism as we know it, sort of spread around the world. And if you go back to Arabic translations of the Bible, that right there is Genesis in Arabic. And if anyone here could read Arabic, you'd see the fourth word says That in the beginning, Allah created the heavens and the earth. So Christians will call upon Allah. So it's simply the Arabic term, it's not a different God. It's the same God that sent Abraham, Noah, Isaac, Ishmael, Moses, Jesus, Muhammad. We believe that it's the same God. So Muslims often are framed as worshiping another God, which is false. So how does Islam view itself vis-à-vis other religions is an important question. Like I've already mentioned, Muslims see the returning point of all theological conversations to be Abraham. So they see themselves as continuing and not replacing. It's interesting there's actually a verse in the Qur'an where God says to the Prophet Muhammad, You are not anything new amongst the prophets. You're not bringing anything new per se. This isn't anything different. But that he is a culmination of the previous messages. So there's one way that some Muslim academics and actually non-Muslim academics frame this, that Muslims believe in Islam with a capital I. And that's the religion that we follow here, here in the mosque. But they also believe in Islam with a lower case I. That all of these other traditions and previous revelations were manifestations of a surrendering to God of that time. So that if you were a follower of Noah on the Ark, that you were in a state of Islam, surrendering to God and following his commandments. And you were therefore a Muslim with a lower case I. One who was living in surrender to God. If you were with Moses standing against Pharaoh, then you were in a state of Islam, surrendering to God, etc. So that's an important concept that's not seen as something foreign or different. Now there's an interesting parable that the Prophet Muhammad gives. Peace be upon him. He says that the parable of my coming is like a beautiful building. And everyone is walking around this beautiful edifice and they're saying what a wondrous building, what beautiful architecture. Except it's just missing that last break. And he says I'm that final break. And so his message to us in that is that this is all a culmination of what previous prophets have fought. The Prophet Muhammad could have said everything is corrupt. My parable is like a bulldozer that comes and removes everything. But he didn't. He said I am just that final break. And so that helps us to understand how Islam views other faith traditions as part of God's plan that were an indispensable part of his mission in his coming. There's another interesting tradition in which the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, talks about the fact that there was no community on earth in the history of humanity to which God did not send guidance. Even if we don't know who they are or in what form it took. And he says that the over 124,000 prophets were sent. So the Aboriginal peoples of Australia must have had a prophet that was sent to them. Someone that told them simply about God, the creator of the universe. All of these were different levels of completion. Sometimes it was very basic. Like for example, the Noah Hiddock laws are much simpler than what Moses brings. The rabbinical legal code is far more complex. But they all include one God, don't kill, don't steal, don't set up idols alongside God. The Ten Commandments are almost something universal to all of the Abrahamic faiths. And in some form exists even in other faith traditions. So in order to understand Islam, and I mean with a capital I now, the religion you came to learn about today, there are three main dimensions to learn about the religion. So the quiz at the end of today will be based on these three. So faith, conduct and character. So I'm going to start talking about conduct. So if you've heard of the five, who here has heard of the five pillars of Islam? So the five pillars of Islam are about half of you. The five pillars actually only summarize conduct. So these are actions that a Muslim must perform. These are the five basic rights and rituals that every Muslim has to perform in order to be minimally performed. So the first are the two testimonies of faith. These are the two statements that if a person believes and proclaims, that enters them into Islam. There's no baptism, there's no formal ceremony or anything like that. If a person says, I believe that there's nothing worthy of worship, say God, and I believe that Muhammad is his last and final messenger, that alone would qualify someone to be able to. So the first pillar is to make that testimony. Thereafter we have five daily prayers based on the position of the sun in relation to where we are. There's a dawn prayer, there's a midday prayer, there's an afternoon prayer, there's a sunset prayer, and then there's a night prayer. And these are five points throughout the day that we spiritually realign ourselves with our purpose, not with Creator. One of the amazing things about human beings, there's a British Muslim scholar who has a great proverb, he would say, how easy it is to forget, how easy it is to forget. We're just forgetful beings. We realign, we wake up in the morning, okay God, I'm just, oh what's my to-do list for today? So we have five points at the day in which we realign, we remind ourselves, we recenter, and these things are there for us to guide us throughout the rest of the day, what it's called. And this is that every Muslim gives two and a half percent of their savings, not their income. They're leftover savings, excess wealth, that sits around in a bank account to be given to the needy and the less fortunate. The fourth is fasting the month of Ramadan. So there's a lunar calendar, and there's a month, it's the ninth month called Ramadan, and how many people have heard of Ramadan? I get curious to know what people have. Okay, that's good. So it's to fast, no water, drink, no food, water, or intimacy from dawn until sunset. And that's currently in about June, May-June right now. So there are relatively long days. And then the last is the pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca. So Mecca is a city, it was alluded to by our sister Hina, that it's in modern day Saudi Arabia. Anybody know who found in the city of Mecca? And he guesses. His name has already been said in Abraham. So Abraham, it's actually in the Bible, it's called Mecca with the B. He goes to the holy city of Mecca, and that's where he lives, Ishmael, and Haver, right? And there's a famous story of the well that Ishmael finds, etc., that's all there in the Old Testament, but that's where we make pilgrimage to, to the house that was erected by Abraham for the worship of the one God. And that's the holiest site of Islam. So that's conduct. Those are five ritual devotions that every Muslim must practice and be committed to as a minimum. Then there are faith, then there's faith. Not things that we do, but things that we believe. Okay? These are things, this is surrendering to God with our body, but then also with our mind, right? Things that we believe are mental conceptions. If you believe the earth is flat or you believe the earth is a sphere, it has to correlate to truth and reality. Those are conceptualizations. So these are five realities that every Muslim must believe. You must believe that there's God. You must believe that he's a reality, that he created the world, that he precedes time, he's outside of time and space. He created time and space and the heavens and the earth, etc. We believe in angels, that these aren't metaphorical beings, that there are really beings that exist in another dimension, right? Beyond our own, but that interact in our dimension by God's command. We also believe in divine scripture, that God communicates with his creation, that he created us for a divine wisdom and purpose to know him and to serve him. But then he communicates this purpose to us through a succession of prophets, okay? And that they all essentially came with the same message, right? When I say essentially, the particulars might differ because that differs with time and place, but their message was essentially the same. God created us, worship him, know him, right? And lived in accordance with morality, okay? So we believe, every Muslim has to believe that the Torah was divinely revealed, that the Psalms were divinely revealed, that the Gospels divinely revealed, and lastly, the Qur'an. Where Muslims may differ from their sisterfates is that the accuracy and authenticity can sometimes fall into question. One of the things that the Qur'an says is that men, we know that religion is great, but sometimes institutions of religion aren't always perfect, right? And that men alter things with their hands, and then so God says, well, we're going to send another revelation to set the record straight. That's not what I said, et cetera. But with the final revelation, God promises a divine protection from alteration. And we can talk more about that perhaps afterwards. Some of the historical evidence of that that's come up recently, that's pretty interesting. The fourth reality I have to believe in are messengers, that God has sent messengers. We've talked about that already. One thing that's worth noting is that for Muslims, our conception of Jesus, our Christology, is closer to a unitary understanding that God sent Jesus as the Messiah. He was born to a virgin birth, and he performed these miracles, and he resurrected the dead and all of these things. But he came as a prophet and not as part of a trinity. He was not God incarnated. He was the Son of God metaphorically, not God the Son, but the Son of God the way that phrase was used by the Hebrews of the time to refer to a godly person. So we hold it to be a mortal prophet who will return at the end of times. He is the awaited Messiah. So for example, if Orthodox Jews don't believe that Jesus was the Messiah, he was still awaiting the Messiah. The Muslims would differ and say, no, he was the Messiah, and those who were present at the time had to follow him in order to be Muslims, right? No more case than that. But that he was a mortal prophet. And then the fifth reality is to believe that we are all going to meet our maker and to be held accountable for our actions. Some people can get away with things here in this world, but nobody ultimately gets away with them. But we pray for God's mercy on that day. Sorry, the last one, this is quickly about participating, is divine decree. One of the things that Muslims believe is that nothing in creation happens without God's willing it and allowing it to be so. Nothing is outside of this power. Good things and bad things happen with God's permission. Because this world was created before a mixture of good and evil. It's a testing ground of our morality and of our free will. And bad things happening isn't separable from free will, but that doesn't indicate that God has gotten out of control over the world outside of his control. So, how many dimensions did we talk about so far? Two, there's a third one coming, but I wanted just a little bit of background here. Keep me on time. So the first is, what is our understanding of humanity? In order to understand this third dimension, you have to understand what is the Islamic conception of what a human being is? What is our nature as human beings? So we have a primary nature. This is our essential nature that we're all born with. Each one of us is healthy and nurtured properly. We have an innate knowledge of right and wrong. Each of us feels guilt. This isn't a socially constructed thing. Each of us knows inside of ourselves that we do something wrong and we feel a sense of remorse against it. We also have this inclination towards something that is good and true and beautiful. That our primary nature finds the beautiful attractive and that the ugly is repulsive. And the same applies to actions. There's a reason that in almost all of human history you have until very recently you have these stories in which the hero gets the bad guy at the end and everybody, now we have the anti-hero. The bad guy gets away at the end. That's a recent modern phenomenon. But everybody knows that that is resonant with human nature. We want to see those things. We want to see good victories over evil. So that's our primary nature. But there is also another aspect of ourselves. We have a selfish ego as well. So while we incline to that which is good and beautiful and true, we also have a capacity perhaps even I'd use the word a tendency towards being vengeful and preoccupied with our bodily pleasures. Now, so we have these two aspects working at the same time. We then have a third which is not endowed with evil. We then have a third which is not endowed with reason. That human beings to borrow Aristotle's term that were rational animals. That what distinguishes us from the rest of creation is that we have the faculty of reason. And so reason is supposed to help us to listen to our primary nature and to be in control of our selfish ego. So you can even think of a basic encounter with a cheesecake. The mind tells you don't touch, don't go there. Right? But the appetite is there. Now if your faculty of reason is stronger than your appetite then you have to say, oh well, you've got a lot of discipline. You're disciplined. But those are training grounds for moral discipline. That's why I'm a Swiss fast. It's one of the reasons we fast. They're all related. The seven deadly sins gluttony is one of them for a reason. If you're gluttonous with food, what does that mean with everything else? One deadly sin. Even though one is enough to kill you. Nobody just has one because they're interrelated. Now, to get to the third dimension, it's character. It's building this character. So there's a process that is termed in Islamic literature as a purification of the soul. It's a process by which a Muslim struggles and strives, this is the greater jihad that might refer to, against the lower desires of their soul to purge these tendencies of the ego that I resist and I fight against my temper and my jealousy and my selfishness. And I work to endow myself with more beautiful virtues. I try to be more generous and more forgiving and more kind and more altruistic. And this process is the way in which I purify my soul. Now, part of this also entails an understanding of how we engage the world itself. When it comes to the world, religion obviously has a lot to say. The Muslim understanding would be that we are in the world but we're not of the world. Right? That we engage the world as one of the great sages of Islam said, it's to have the money in your hand but not in your heart. So you don't live a life of rejection of the world. We don't go and live in monasteries. We're here in Pleasanton, California, working jobs and we have houses. But we're not here to enjoy this place. That's not at the very purpose. The place is a bridge. It's a means to an end. This is a spiritual laboratory if you will, in which we're supposed to exercise and work at the training ground for the afterlife. And so we go between the two extremes of indulgence on the one hand and rejection. So again just to recap, Islam views itself as a culmination of previous religious traditions. The final brick as it were in God's long successive revelation. If one surrenders to God we believe it will bring peace and harmony to the individual and to society as a whole. And it sees itself as a middle road of bringing together the great virtues of previous tradition. So for example the Jewish tradition is known to have a great, rich, legal tradition but Jesus came to remind us that the spirit of the law is greater than the letter of the law as well. So the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him we believe merges these two and brings each in its right place that there is a, as Hina talked about we have Sharia, we believe in a letter of the law but the spirit of the law, those six objectives the preservation of life and religion and intellect and family and property and honor all of those things, that stays at the center of their all. And so we balance ourselves as surrendered to God with our minds in terms of what we believe with our bodies in terms of the fact that we pray and we refrain from doing anything that harms another person or stealing and then with our souls because we work on purifying ourselves curging ourselves of our egos tendencies and adorning the virtues of the heart. I thank you for attention to this sort of just a summary slide thank you for your time and thank you for just being here today.