Recordings › Why I look & dress the way I do? - Mufti Abu Layth al-Maliki · 8 Mar 2018 › Segment 1 of 1
Why do you dress in a t-shirt and joke around while teaching Islam?
ramadhan ramzan ramazan ramadaan muftis jahannam jahanam jahannum ma sha allah masha'allah masha allah mashaa allah taqwa taqwaa muttaqi god-consciousnessWhy he dresses and behaves the same on screen as off
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This segment0:00 to 7:47 · 7 min 47 sGeneral teaching
The answer in brief
machinesummary, machine-writtenMufti Abu Layth dresses and acts the same on and off screen so that nobody meets a different person in real life. Putting on a pious appearance for the camera would be a double standard and would create cognitive dissonance in viewers.
In more detail
Mufti Abu Layth raises the criticism that he sits in a t-shirt and jokes while speaking about Islam, and that he would not go to a business interview looking that way. He replies that he is at home in his own study, that he dresses and behaves exactly the same off screen, and that acting differently on screen would be a double standard that would make viewers see him as a hypocrite when they met him. He says he has never claimed to be pious, that he declines invitations to speak on piety, and that he does the bare minimum of practice while loving and teaching the legacy of Islam. He tells a story of meeting a mufti from al-Azhar [?] in Egypt who always wore the scholarly gown, then turned up to an outing in jeans and a tracksuit, so that Mufti walked past him without recognising him; he says this is the cognitive dissonance he wants to spare his own viewers. He adds that he does wear a suit at conferences, and that if people are going to judge him, what they see is what they get.
Question as read aloud · questioner not identifiedSome people say you mostly sit in a t-shirt while speaking about Islam, and that you would not go to a business interview looking like that; why do you look and dress the way you do?
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Kind: general teachingTranscript
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some people say you know mostly you sit in a t-shirt and you do this and you do this look this is my own house you know I'm sitting at home right now by the way but this is my kind of man cave I've made in here this is like a library I've got an arcade machine as well of retro from the 80s and 90s I bought an arcade this is where I chip this is my man cave I this I'm at home this is how I am right now I understand people are saying well you know if you go to a business interview you wouldn't go looking like that well I'm not at a business interview to start off with secondly
people say well what you're speaking about Islam look I want to I please listen to this from me now this is about me at least give me the right to express myself and this is to my haters as well right because this seems to be a hell of a lot right so look the way you see me here you see me here right now I'm cracking jokes I'm laughing I'll suddenly start laughing about something I'll suddenly do things I am like that if you find me outside on the street like if you see me someday in a shop in
a cafe at the gym or wherever you see me I will be exactly how I am I'll actually dress like this I don't dress differently for this talk it's not like I normally walk around in a I mean when I go to you know it's not like I'm walking around in a jewban and when I'm here I just put on my t-shirt for you guys I don't I this is that you know if you see me right now I'll be sitting let's say from quite often when Alomar crowed having our vampire sessions drinking tea chatting it's how I'm saying this is how I'm laughing this I'm doing things I
don't change for the screen off screen on screen I'm the same that's the problem that people find people say to me on screen you should be different but why because I find that as double standards like if you find me outside like imagine I act really serious and no reason we always like this and and I always wear a jewban then you see me on the street one day and you see you think that guy isn't that monster I believe what a hypocrite look at him he's acting like it just like a regular lad and you know and there he is on line acting all
pious but I don't act pious I don't I've never said to anybody on peyer's I don't people have asked me Mufti would you come and give a talk on piety would you give a talk on the benefits of of reading so much to her truth and doing vicar I've said no well why he have said no I said because I don't I don't practice stuff like that I I'm not a pious person like that so yes Allah has inspired me to love Islam in its legacy and and I love that and I learn about it and I try to teach what I learned that's all I do you know
I I just probably bare minimum in Islam you know praying and keeping Ramadan fasts and stuff like that but I'm not out there trying to act like hey I'm some kind of super pious beats up I'm not right so look but why I do this is so I can keep it real like if you see me you're not gonna have cognitive dissonance let me tell you you don't look I this is not to be judgmental you know several years back I was in a less harm right for for a short while for just just a couple of weeks and there was a great mufti who I love the most
the Ovilus hard in Egypt really got on with him awesome you know great guy great mashallah and he really took a liking to me as well and always in that let her gown I forgot I don't know what they call it now I didn't know but they have that special other gown the special as her kind of attire and always very kind of held himself and everything and and by the way I love this and this is in no way I'm not taking a dig at this person in any way the reason I mentioned this story is just to tell you so you can relate to it know this this person is an awesome beautiful amazing person right so that's please don't take any message like that from this but this guy
one day so we're chilling out while there for a couple of weeks and towards the end he said like alright well I'm gonna take you guys out I'm gonna take you guys to the pyramids we're gonna chill out and show you around nyeh awesome handling that so we went out this day and we're meeting at this place and this Musti has come and but he had come in jeans and like a tracksuit top and like this kind of cap I'm not judgmental well I am how could I be judgmental I mean just look at me I totally walked past him I didn't know who he was like I just thought he's just somebody else part of the group so I'm
waiting the household so I'm thinking ah so the most he hasn't come today damn and then all of a sudden he's talking to me and I I'm like oh my god well lucky I had cognitive dissonance like this is me having cognitive dissonance because he just looked so different now I'm not to judge him but can you imagine now of regular Muslims if I like this is how I feel if I did things like that like if I every time I sit down wear a gown and atho band and then you catch me on a rock road like
this like this in a t-shirt you're gonna think he isn't that that's musty look at him at nothing not a you know this guy off here look how he is [Music] you know are you not gonna be honest be honest won't ye you are people I would even do it I mean I'd be like I'm gonna have to have confess I'd be judgmental
bigger and I'd be like oh so but even I would end up doing that so look this is why I just want to be normal I want people to judge me fine I mean I don't want them to judge me but if they're gonna judge me what you see is what you get okay you sketch me outside I'm gonna be exactly cash massage ha you catch me outside um be exactly the same you're gonna think bloody and I'm gonna laugh the same as well I'm gonna crack jokes the same as well and I'm gonna produce the stupid kind of little I don't know idiosyncrasies that I do all
the time I'm gonna do them too and that's just that's just who I am I'm not gonna put on an act for a screen and I get that that you know makes me makes many people say oh you know we can't call this person to this and we can't call him to lectures or conferences and fine no I don't need that I am Who I am and by the way and for the record when I do go to conferences I do with suits you know like like everybody else I know people go oh you know if you go into a business meeting would you dress like that but when I go to a conference you don't see me in a t-shirt at a conference whenever I go to these talks and conferences I'm always in my suit so
I don't see what this thing is about but anyway I thought that was really important to mention I didn't mean to kind of go on about half of all of this but I thought these were some really important points
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Cite this segment
Stable id, transcript version and tier are part of the citation. Every change to a transcript is logged.Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment 2018-03-08-S01, auto-transcribed, may contain errors. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/47ghxxhtln8/s/1/ (accessed 1 November 2026)
- APA 7
Mufti Abu Layth. (2018, March 8). Why do you dress in a t-shirt and joke around while teaching Islam? [Video, segment 2018-03-08-S01, auto-transcribed, may contain errors]. Mufti Abu Layth Archive. Retrieved November 1, 2026, from https://muftiabulayth.org/r/47ghxxhtln8/s/1/
- Chicago author-date
Mufti Abu Layth. 2018. "Why do you dress in a t-shirt and joke around while teaching Islam?" Video, segment 2018-03-08-S01, auto-transcribed, may contain errors. Mufti Abu Layth Archive. Recorded March 8, 2018. Accessed November 1, 2026. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/47ghxxhtln8/s/1/
- BibTeX
@misc{abulayth-2018-03-08-S01, author = {Mufti Abu Layth}, title = {{Why do you dress in a t-shirt and joke around while teaching Islam?}}, year = {2018}, month = {3}, date = {2018-03-08}, howpublished = {\url{https://muftiabulayth.org/r/47ghxxhtln8/s/1/}}, url = {https://muftiabulayth.org/r/47ghxxhtln8/s/1/}, organization = {Mufti Abu Layth Archive}, urldate = {2026-11-01}, note = {Segment 2018-03-08-S01, auto-transcribed, may contain errors} }
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