Detailed Advice for those Aspiring to Studying Islam -Mufti Abu Layth

Oh what's going on people what are the right I'd been asked a question so that's I've been asked a question on what do I recommend for people wanting to study wanting to learn what's my advice for that for them so what I would say is that look I think first of all it is amazing and that this anybody wanting to study the science of the sciences of Islam the man the myth from my daughter

ha ha ha Leila dad the legend right so the the thing is that I would I would definitely I would encourage anybody and everybody that has an interest to study the Islamic Sciences they are really amazing once you get into them and it's amazing if you can relate that to to our current context I want to just spend a

few minutes explaining this right first of all I just want to touch up on the importance of this I'll mention what as a strategy what you can do and then also the key objectives so the importance of these people is that it really is the only way to truly be able to reconnect to our legacy to this tradition to this beam of Alice LOM and to understand it in our day and age because I feel that we are in a time where really it's the

clergy have kind of in many ways failed us ok we are failed by the the kind of institutions and I don't think institutionalized religion is going to rescue us we need to to kind of I've into this amazing majestic tradition of ours and really go to the core and we need to at the call we will find the heartbeat and the pulse of this

theme in the Quran in the authentic Sunna in this tradition that teaches us that allows us to reconnect in a natural way in the way of the fitrah okay which is the natural order of things not a not a kind of organized or institutionalized version of religion that is actually quite cataclysmic in my understanding right so okay so that's the important what what do I advise people I advise people first of all look listen when you

need to learn Arabic okay Arabic is key for studying Islam because the Quran is in Arabic the Sunnah is in Arabic the tradition this whole tradition is really in Arabic and also people buried away in in the cobwebs of censorship at the heart of our tradition lie many gems which are in Arabic but we have to unearth them and people are not gonna do

it for us okay right people are not going to really allow us to like people who have too much at stake even institutional the institutionalized clergy has too much at stake to encourage people to unearth sensitive material within Islam because they you see because it's it's quite simple really it's all about power positions you will not want to do something that compromises the very position and the power structure that you are a part of

that doesn't that's just that's logic people okay so so aerobic is essential and it is not difficult so the good so the good news is that it's not difficult to learn it is an amazing and beautiful language honestly it's something that you will be so glad that you learnt it will reconnect you with this theme it will it there's almost 30 Arabic speaking countries in the world people I mean just look at the you know if not anything just look at it as a fun

enterprise in which you can tourism you can travel you can meet new people you can like just look at how many your life will change people I mean this when I say that your life will change it will it will give you the it will enhance your IQ I ice I do passionately believe that that learning a language enhances your cognitive and perceptive faculties I mean this psychological research to support that the sapir-whorf ian hypothesis and the research they've done demonstrated how your the language you

speak impacts your perception of the world there's been a lot of research done on that do you look at things from what angle and the parties and that's an interesting study if you want to take some time out and look at that they looked at participants that were spoke one language and bilingual and and they took I believe it was Chinese and American participants English speaking and they administered tests and when the tests were done in English participants by far enlarge kind of scored in a particular way but when they were

administered in Chinese they scored in another way but this could have been ache and to remove the confounding variable of cultural of enculturation that it could be a socialized element of perception what they did is they found a kind of control group with bilingual participants who could speak English and Chinese and administered the same tests to them but in different at different times in different languages and when they were administered the same test in English they scored like the English speaking but when given in Chinese they scored like the Chinese speaking people which demonstrated and the tests were to do

with how you saw universals and particulars and what fields ah doubt in this particular place and if you had to group four of these six objects together which four would you group and why and so your perception of the world was being impacted by the language that you speak and this is amazing I'm not sure I feel it taps into what people like Vidkun Stein had said in almost 100 years ago that that he felt that we thought was in language that we thought in language that's interesting I'm not exactly I'm not a hundred percent sure

that we do think in language although I think language is definitely an integral part of thought so I think the deeper your language is developed the more intricate your thought processes can become I definitely feel these there is a connection right so okay so that's language people you're gonna love it oh all I'm saying is you're gonna love it I would advise what are some practical steps okay not advised you can a book I've always recommended his doctor sorties Quranic Arabic doctor sortie an amazing individual who has a

book with its I I love the book okay the book is designed that it it kind of has a graded process by which you will gradually start to with each exercise or with each unit understanding comprehend so much of the Quran and that increasingly develops as you move through the book so I think that's an amazing book of is I recommend it to everybody it's one of the first books I studied and I taught it for many years on end afterwards I taught it in schools I taught in colleges when I taught I taught it privately but in addition to

that there are there is other I mean there there is other material out there I've heard many great things about stars nominally Hans Boehner course I mean main role on that people there's a distant learning course it's tried and tested many people have done it there's many apps you can download on your phone and just get through them in fact I'm I'm going through one in Spanish it's actually very I'm enjoying it let me just see what the app is called this one's called busu a strange name

but bu s W so busuu not as in a W but as in you you double you so but I mean I believe they've got an option to learn Arabic the but there's so many things you can watch TV in Arabic you can watch movies in a week you can watch TV series just get on the six months you will be good a year you're rockin that's what I'm talking about so that's the move to California are raha yeah my Spanish

would shoot through the roof if I I'm thinking I need to at some point take some time and explore Latin America let's go but then I think I'm thinking I've watched too many of these series with this there's so many hit all you think is like cartels and you're gonna be tortured somewhere taking out your fingernails and you're like I do quite order a manicure but oh you're gonna cut that you know I could do with that finger to be honest with you believe me

that finger as comes quite useful so i mean but i but yeah but so this what i was saying is the arabic is key alongside the arabic people you can study fit there's a lot of courses out there fit is your understanding of this theme okay you can you can start at a very elementary level is going to teach you the five pillars of Islam it will expand to a more to an a beginner intermediate level it will go into other transactions it will go into intermediate level they will mention the

different schools of thought the different opinions now a lot of these things admittedly some of the things may be archaic and therefore irrelevant and immaterial but it still gives you a connection the element of worship is definitely something that you will get there's many books now in English in fact there's many courses going on this for popular methods I say for generously I'm letting the humble ease in should we give that finger for the humble ease the small fingers like so well you've got look so I mean the methods are there

you've got the four kind of major schools beginning with the dawn and the legendary school of Medina people in my Malick's method which really need i say more it really just stops there that's but nevertheless will include the others too to let them feel well feel better so you got the hanafi madhhab you got the chef ie and the ham belly and you can basically just find some text you can find some teachers there's a lot of stuff online there's you know this this course is going on for if you want to learn the school of Medina I've got some

lectures on YouTube called the school of Medina in the 21st century that's a good lecture to listen to it gives the background the backdrop to Imam Malik he's his mother he's built on and why it's relevant for the 21st century there's I've got how to pray on youtube a video showing demonstrating the Salah in that's according to school of MIDI and that will cover the basics I've got a very basic course just covering some pillars of Islam called the ash pan ash Maurya this is in the Maliki method and you don't need to listen to mine you can just go get hold of the ash mal yam many people have done commentaries on me

some people use another parallel called the body which is more often in like northwest Africa schmeyer yes more so in Northeast Africa they tend to use and then after that this this other you can move up the the scale there's some people study a book I've taught these foundations of Islam that's the pillars of Islam by far the yard who was the legendary Maliki scholar from Muslim Spain I have that in 20 lectures on YouTube you can order your lectures you can listen to that but other people people might teach something else at this stage they might

teach something like the total clean of are the observer harburg daddy I am thinking in Charlotte to resume teaching fit and I will probably be teaching the Saltine so that's that people but people have already taught that out there some people move on to the result of even Abizaid al-qaeda wony he was known as young Malik this is in Malachy Fick I'm giving the kind of a kind of like a syllabus if you like people study this is really an intermediate and depending on the commentaries can be touching into advanced as well so people cover these

and then there's in the Maliki fit and some people might study a book called a cobble Masonic which is biter deed you can check out by the way I shall be Lee's website I shall be Lee she's part of the the Maliki community within the UK who's translating and contributed significantly to Maliki works and the legacy in the English language after hubby Lee and her husband and and that whole community really in Norwich they they they have done a lot but on her website she has a lot of works translated so she has the reseller

and the commentary in English so you could you could see these so some people do teach at this stage like I said as well the a crabber Masonic which is by deed then you go on to advanced level at this level people often teach motifs or Halil that say although it's a brief text but it's really kind of enigmatic almost quite it's like written encoder almost some people teach the German on my heart of ignore hardship which is also called the mostest or or Ferrari this is within the Maliki method and these come with commentaries and if it's the German Roma heart then Khalil

himself as a commentary on that no one has told ya but people that are teaching the most uh sort of Halil there's so many commentaries that you can go through hot bob is a very popular one loved by so many people known as the book is termed more hippo jelly so this is within the Maliki kind of but these are people you don't need to do all of that kind of straightaway this is just a structure for life you're just kind of moving along okay you're just kind of studying you're getting the basics out the way you're moving on to intermediate discourse you're learning there's in the other methods they have similar kind of

their own work so you'll have in the Hanafi method they will begin with books like noodley though they will probably I mean I'm just rushing through it they that's an elementary level they will probably move on to Kaduri and then advanced text like he Thalia as an example of McInerney and and then they have very detailed Futaba texts like other methods as well okay that's right so now and so the reason I'm mentioning these things is just to kind of give you an example but

right now you can just begin on the on the foundational level if it's Malachy you could look for anything very simple from those I gave a few if it's Schaffer ie sorry if it's Hanafy you could look for new delayed Arthur chef at a maybe mattina be sugar or something you can look for something very basic and go through them there's a lot of teachers this course is by seekers hub I believe that are free they're available online but there's a lot out they just start reconnecting start reconnecting and the amazing thing about the internet people is that you can just start learning and you can stop constructing knowledge okay and yes

it is true that these books severely need updating they need to be Reese inked with our day and age but if you get the basics out the way you kind of start to see okay how were those people thinking and then we can start to work well well the worship part it's gonna be very similar anyway on Moodle and stuff some parts won't but many parts will still be similar so that's fine you can look into a soul which is the underlying legal theory these are just this is just some advice I'm I'm just sharing with people that we that may want to reconnect and something that look I would advise you people I would advise

you is that start learning about people right start learning about people because once you start to read about people in the past it starts to come to life for you who was this scholar who were his teachers Oh what was an interesting incident what was Oh what were they caught up in oh what was this controversy here that happened here Oh what was this you know just read up different people you it's amazing how we as humans can construct knowledge we can pick obviously it's amazing sometimes I get distracted people and I'll be I'll

be kind of sitting there and I'll be oh what's that you know curiosity I've got like I've got like a money curious mind sometimes if I allow it and what will happen is I will be doing something and I think what's that and before I know it I'm researching this word and this concept and then I'm like oh wait a minute what's that and then I've got into this over who did this and oh oh so who brought who challenged these Oh mmm what's that about Oh what's this video

what's that four hours later people then six hours later I'm like an expert it's like now I just know so much about something so useless I just don't know what it's like I feel I need to share that knowledge now I'll probably just know something like oh really something really odd but just not so much about it now and you're kind of thinking well hmm I just don't know what

to do with this knowledge now so so is that how is that how how movies began I mean it was that the Oh mmm right so this is so this is the kind of things that that I get up to in my spare time researching all this stuff but what I meant is it's an amazing way to construct knowledge