# Yasir Qadhi's reply to Jay Smith over 'holes in the standard narrative'

- URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/ttq_cxlvaso/s/1/
- Date: 2020-12-10 · Kind: discussion · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Yasir Qadhi's reply to Jay Smith & ultracrepidarian | Mufti Abu Layth (0:00–6:58)
- Status: a view quoted in order to be discussed, not a position held
- Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttQ_CXlVaso&t=0s
- Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/ttq_cxlvaso/

**Topics:** Exchanges with Yasir Qadhi; Preservation and variant readings; Christians and other faiths

**Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** A played clip of Yasir Qadhi answering Christian polemicists who used his 'holes in the standard narrative' remark, calling them unqualified and likening variant readings to accents.

## Longer summary

Mufti Abu Layth introduces the week's segment on Yasir Qadhi's video replying to Jay Smith, David Wood and Daniel Brubaker, who had been pressing him over his phrase that there are holes in the standard narrative of the Quran. He plays snippets in which Yasir Qadhi says his phrase has been misused by Christian missionaries, calls himself an academic who researches what he says, points out errors by Jay Smith and others, and calls them 'ultracrepidarians' whom he wants Muslims to popularise the word for. In the clip Yasir Qadhi says there are many standard narratives, the one he holds being just not the most common today, and likens differences between readings to American and British pronunciation of the same sentence. Mufti comments lightly and mimics the accents.

## Sources and names cited

- Yasir Qadhi
- Jay Smith
- David Wood
- Daniel Brubaker
- Hafs
- Abdullah Yusuf Ali
- Marmaduke Pickthall

## Transcript (machine tier, 0:00–6:58)

[0:00] so right let's move on to what uh our beloved i think we have to move on to the massage the the kind of masala segment if we like it's a bit of an explanation but yep so all right people arrive so the

[0:29] the entertaining masala flavor and ingredient for this week is back alright one of the yakidites which is uh although on this we don't know what yakina has to say but yes alcadi so what's happened is yasser khadi as you may be familiar made another video and

[1:02] it was a reply to j smith david wood and uh dan bro i'm gonna get his name wrong but it'll come up but a few people who have been really going yasar khadi for the holes in the narrative um so here's a very brief clip

[1:29] i think okay it says no okay well here it is so today is going to be a very uh atypical personal library chat uh for in case some of you are totally unaware uh there has been a a massive controversy raging over my head regarding an interview that was done a number of months ago about the quran and i used a phrase there there are holes in the the standard narrative that has been misused and abused by a number of christian missionaries i have no choice but to

[2:09] stoop to their level and to expose how utterly unqualified these people are just to demonstrate why it is an utter waste of someone like myself's time who i consider inshallah and my reputation is known to all of you i consider myself to be an academic i consider myself to be somebody who researches everything that i say and willing to engage and dialogue and debate and defend and take and admit if i was wrong so every province these are just some snippets i've only put in here not the whole talk he's talking about the province this is j smith he's making some errors so yeah all the highlights damascus jerusalem

[2:46] alexandria cairo parat and there's the word i was looking for nishapur successful in egypt but before that i forgot i forgot one thing when they did this in cairo when they uh al-hadad muhammad al-hada did this in cairo they took all the other qurans that were different yeah than huffs they took it out into a boat and they sang them in the nile oh you've heard this before you know i looked at a number of their references generally speaking a lot of their quotations a lot of their material is coming from a particular person by the name of david brubacher and again i don't have anything personal against

[3:24] this individual he takes the lam ha and he does not understand that it's thirty plus five laps verse number 35 and god couldn't you have just looked up yusuf ali or marmaduke pictol i mean see if you don't even know your imra from your raju man from your man from your woman in any language then i don't know what to say and crepidarian is a person who not only speaks outside of his area of speaks way out of his league but he also

[4:02] feels the need to announce to the world that he is an utter idiot this is the word that comes to mind when i'm dealing with these people ultra crepitarian memorize it start using this word and popularize it again because that is exactly what these preachers are ultra crepitarians they are not only still one of them the one that has become dominant the one that is now you know mainstream this is what i called the standard narrative but in reality there are many standard narratives even what i'm holding is a standard narrative it's just not the one that is most common in our times and so i am

[4:42] again what i don't want to go there's no need to go into diesels in the video and i'm more than happy to discuss with and these idiots and ignoramuses and that is why i have to make this video the problem with these critics is that they think they have unearthed something absolutely absolutely new that no one before them has ever understood they exactly i mean american and british english right uh what's what's a few words that the americans and the brits pronounce differently i mean what if an american says can you bring me a glass can you bring me a glass of water can you bring okay let me put in garage because that's definitely always an important uh can you bring a glass of water to the garage okay if an american says that a brit says it how is he gonna say it

[5:21] right uh i'm gonna try my fake british accent here can you bring a glass of water to the garage right they speak in a higher level into the garage you know there's differences right glass of water to the garage right there's a difference there is anybody going to say that these are two different versions i mean how foolish is this but this is what the equivalent of what they're doing now again to be fair obviously there are more differences uh than pronunciation and there's sometimes differences and not but again these are all differences that are well known well accommodated they at whichever understanding of the follow and there's over 40

[6:00] whichever one you follow all of these differences are explained in a very very rational manner that fits in with everything else oh rather can you bring a glass of water to the garage please oh rather

[6:27] i don't know why he put that uh what is it that kind of cockney her water water we do know what a t sounds like but yeah so right so yes right as you can see ultra crepitarians rather right so what's happened let me fill you in

## Cite

Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment ttQ_CXlVaso/s/1. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/ttq_cxlvaso/s/1/

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