# Did everyone at the time of the Prophet accept Islam without questions?

*Poets at the time of the Prophet, and a deen that complements life*

- URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/oyiipehuiha/s/14/
- Date: 2021-04-26 · Kind: discussion · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Lupe Fiasco | Stardom, Semiotics & Soul-searching | MindTrap#56 | Mufti Abu Layth al-Maliki MALM (1:10:04–1:15:55)
- Status: latest answer on its topic; general teaching
- Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYiiPEhuiHA&t=4204s
- Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/oyiipehuiha/

**Topics:** Arabic poetry and men of letters; Pre-Islamic Arabia; Islam and modernity

**Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** The guest says early Muslims, including poets, had real critiques; Mufti Abu Layth says the deen should complement life rather than complicate it.

## Longer summary

The guest says he uses Ramadan to study religion, recalling that as a young man reading the Quran felt like God threatening him personally. He describes a study he is reading of poets who lived from the jahiliyya into Islam, who he says were somewhat agnostic about it and criticised the restraint placed on the young and on freedom of expression, a society of shame but not guilt. He says he does not believe everyone at the time of the Prophet had no critiques or problems the spiritual could not solve, and that people then, as now, sought compromises to live right by God while still being sensory human beings. Mufti Abu Layth says he has often said that the deen ought to complement one's life and not complicate it, and that institutionalisation over the centuries has turned it into a list of don'ts that has lost its spirit.

## Sources and names cited

- Lupe Fiasco (guest)
- jahiliyya
- deen

## Transcript (machine tier, 1:10:04–1:15:55)

[1:09:25] so you or another people who are let's who are putting words together putting poetry and music and and inspiring people uh making them kind of reflect but in a way that they can relate is so much more powerful than just somebody saying well you know i i know you should just go to the mosque and pray or just saying you know just just be good it doesn't quite cut it it's not real yeah i was i was i was uh reading i use ramen i use ramadan to kind of just study uh religion

[1:10:03] um and i came upon um interested in poets and it was weird every time when i was when i was when i was younger and even now not so much now because i kind of gave myself a break when i was younger when i read the quran i thought god was talking to me it was like you're the poet and i'm when i'm i'ma see you in hell boy don't worry about it i know what you did last week right i was like yo i can't read this book because it's scary right but i say that to say i always i always try to use use ramadan to get into you know the nooks and crannies in the context of religion i actually bumped into this uh this piece about poets um during the time of of prophet muhammad

[1:10:42] saw islam right like who were in a period of time where they were considered to be pre-islamic yeah right in the jahilia and were converted into or brought into the time of islam and kind of live through it as poets yeah right and there was a study there's a a a journal interest i still have i'm still kind of working through it on my phone but it was kind of like the gist of like these these poets who were kind of like it wasn't this big deal you know it wasn't like this big relevatory thing it was just like here's the sign of the times okay and they they weren't they were

[1:11:22] kind of agnostic to it you know and i'm sure because it was probably some other social context or or or things going down where conversion was just like okay all right you know and it wasn't like a critical thing but they did still have critiques on the macro and their critiques were like and again bringing this back to me as a poet in these times and being a social criticism and and consciousness and stuff like that one of the critiques of the poets back then and this is during time muhammad saw islam was you know the the youth are kind of being told what to say they're being like restrained you know there's this restraint that's

[1:12:01] happening right this freedom of expression is kind of being clamped down right and that was one that one of the poets kind of critiques um where it's like you know they're from an age where it was about you know expressing yourself and you know having a certain level of of shame but not guilt yeah and it was like yeah we had shame we had like you know restrictions and stuff like that but it wasn't like a guilt thing and it wasn't like we could we can write a poem about whatever we wanted um not to say that there was there was censorship but they felt like in the youth that they were that were being born during that time

[1:12:40] apologized no you know coming up coming up in a society um where they were kind of just being controlled you know their their expressions were being constrained um and if you think like that's happening and being recognized and witnessed um in the time of prophesy islam right um was everybody cool like i don't i don't believe everybody who who was either born into born into islam during that time or converted to islam didn't have critiques or real world situations that they had to deal with you know that that the spiritual couldn't solve

[1:13:18] you know that prophet saw islam would would be like i don't know what we gonna do you know what i'm saying like we don't have we figured this out together or something like that the same way you see it today with people seeking counselors or seeking guidance from a man or a multi like yourself or different folks in the community you know and maybe having to kind of go out of that to realize like look this isn't compatible you know with the life that i was used to or this is incompatible with the life that i want you know and how can we kind of align these things um and and what are my you know i don't want to go to hell like i don't want to be damned in this i don't want to be taken over by the gin i don't want to i

[1:13:57] don't want to be uh executed for heresy i don't want to be considered an apostate i don't want this i want that so what are the reconciliations and the compromises that can be made um for me to you know feel valuable you know to feel like i'm actually you know living right you know by god you know living right by other folks you know um but still you know getting my rocks off you know as a human being and understanding i'm a sensory person i want to experience things and do that so it's interesting that i think that a lot of a lot of the times there's a sanitation that takes place you know and if you don't fit

[1:14:35] anything that comes out it's considered to be haram or whatever really there's aspects of it that you know there has it's always been this kind of rocky road and turbulent people trying to figure their place out and having critiques about it because i because i've said i've often said that the dean is something that ought to complement your life and not complicate it it's not something which you know this is it's meant to be something organic something which flows with you not like just just like hurdles that you have to keep trying to and i and what's happened unfortunately over the

[1:15:14] centuries and and institutionalization as well i guess it's just made it so difficult for people that it's just a list of don't do's you know like don't don't don't don't don't and and it's it's taken the spirit of the faith out of it like it's kind of it's lost that message along the way you know speaking you mentioned about poets and pre-islamic poets now um this just just tying that into something uh that you've also worked on that it reminded me that there's a classical poet

## Cite

Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment oYiiPEhuiHA/s/14. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/oyiipehuiha/s/14/

Not a fatwa: these answers were given to specific people at specific times. Ask a qualified scholar about your own situation.