Early version. Transcripts and tags are labelled by accuracy tier. A position is shown only after two independent reviews have found it in his own words.
89 answers in 39 recordings, 2015 to 2024. 56 with a checked position in his own words.
Indexed so far: 259 of 1,859 recordings (1,904 answers, 2014 to 2025). Anything below may change as the rest are indexed. Limits of the data
Thought Evolution
2015answers checked positions2024
Oldest first. A checked position shows what he holds, then the sentence he says, word for word from the transcript, with its moment. Years without one list the answers that have not been checked yet. Recordings not yet indexed may hold more.
Mufti Abu Layth says the view of politically active groups that any association with the government is serving a false god is not a correct scholarly interpretation, since assisting non-Muslim authorities does not make them gods besides Allah, while accepting that elements within these programmes have worked against Muslims, himself included, and that Prevent needs review.
“I completely disagree categorically that these are Nots these are not false gods but I do accept that there are negative elements that are within these strategies”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that extremism is tackled by reclaiming traditional Islam and owning the concept of jihad, which exists in the Quran and Sunnah with its context and conditions, rather than by denying it, which feeds groups such as ISIS.
“I do feel that in order to tackle it we need to reclaim traditional Islam”
Mufti Abu Layth says that in his understanding the hudud would today be substituted, by demand of the Sharia, with penalties relevant to the age such as custodial sentences.
“in my understanding in this day and age the ha dude would be substituted by demand of the sharia so they would not be things like in my understanding definitely not things like stoning”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that if a crime has been committed it must be reported to the authorities, that vigilante justice is haram, and that a haram act that is not a crime is for Allah alone to judge.
“vigilante justice is haram for a valid reason in Islam it is not okay for people to get together and say we will do vigilante justice”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that commanding good and forbidding evil (hisbah) belongs to legitimate authority and to qualified scholars, only in matters that are clearly agreed upon, and not to individuals acting on their own.
“they are only four people in legit authority to take to task they are not for you and me to just go around and command the good and forbid the evil”
Mufti Abu Layth says a mufti does not have to be appointed by the state and can hold a voluntary or a professional role.
“is a Mufti meant to be somebody appointed by the state doesn't have to be appointed by the state it can be a muscly can be a voluntary or a professional role”
Mufti Abu Layth says the report slanders the Prophet, since calling a woman a fornicator is qadhf punishable under the Quran and, for the Malikis, regardless of intention, and the Prophet was never obscene and would not have labelled women this way to deter them.
“this is the Prophet would never ever have said something like this this is a slander against the honor of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam right that he would speak about women in such a way”
Mufti Abu Layth says Islam gives freedom of faith and condemns coercion, and that neither the Quran nor the established Sunnah says an apostate must be killed.
“an apostate must be killed that is not true an apostate is not killed in Islam”
Mufti Abu Layth says the sanctity of life is conclusive in Islam and that the preservation of life and freedom of religion for everyone are among the aims of the shari'ah.
“so these things we understand that the sanctity of life is cotton it is cut i ok the sanctity of life is conclusive”
Mufti Abu Layth says that where classical scholars prescribed capital punishment they were addressing what would today be treason or rebellion in a very different world, that those rulings do not apply today, and that the whole world doing the same then does not make them right.
“any of these rulings today clearly do not apply many of these scholars have said today”
Mufti Abu Layth says the Prophet never executed anyone for disbelief or apostasy, pointing to his treatment of Abdullah ibn Ubayy, his dealings with Jews until his death, Ibn Sayyad and his pardon of Abdullah ibn Abi Sarh.
“according to that hadith which most of these people accept that person became an apostate did the Prophet instruct for him to be executed never”
Mufti Abu Layth argues that the practice of giving an apostate the chance to return, and the Hanafi exemption of the female apostate, show that the classical punishment was aimed at armed rebellion against the community rather than at disbelief.
“because they saw them as part of this insurgency this part of this rebellion against the Muslim state of the past that's why they said the female apostate would not be harmed”
Mufti Abu Layth says that scholars who ruled that apostates be executed unless they returned to Islam were clearly and categorically wrong, being products of an age that placed little value on human life.
“but they got it wrong if they said that they were wrong clearly clearly and categorically”
Mufti Abu Layth says the report 'whoever changes his religion, kill him' clashes with the absolute verse of the Quran on freedom of belief and must be read in its full context of Ali burning people alive and Ibn Abbas objecting.
“first of all this narration apart from it clashing with the absolute verse of the Quran let's read the full narration”
Mufti Abu Layth says the chain of the apostasy report through Anas is also problematic, because of a narrator with Mu'tazili tendencies and Qatada's known tadlis, and that the report clashes with reason, the Quran, the Prophet's life and the principles of Islam.
“the other thing is that it clearly clashes with all three it clashes with reason I slammed giving you freedom of belief a clashes with the established sources the Quran and the clear life of the Prophet”
Mufti Abu Layth says an apostate cannot be killed for disbelief, since that would make every disbeliever deserving of death, and that giving an apostate three days to return on pain of death is absurd, coerces hypocrisy and belittles the Prophet's thirteen years of preaching in Makkah.
“you are assuming that you can convert anybody back to faith within three days then in that case why do you go out and convert the world”
Mufti Abu Layth says there is no verse and no conclusively established hadith for killing apostates, and that life, whose sanctity is conclusive, cannot be taken on the basis of isolated reports that carry doubt.
“there isn't a single verse in the Quran that would ever say this and in fact the Quran is against this message”
Mufti Abu Layth says that whether a person leaves Islam is between them and God and they should be left alone, and that those who have given a distorted image of the Prophet bear the blame for people's hatred of him.
“to judge the look if a person left Islam that's the that's between them and God leave them alone”
Mufti Abu Layth says Sahih al-Bukhari has been given a de facto status on par with or above the Quran, which he rejects entirely: it is a book like the other hadith collections and the Quran always takes precedence over it.
“i will never ever accept that status that is more powerful than the quran or even on par with the quran or even just slightly below the quran that is nonsense”
Mufti Abu Layth says that when al-Ghazali and scholars of his time wrote of the caliph they meant kingship as opposed to anarchy, not as opposed to democracy.
“when those people in the past wrote about rule when what they meant was as opposed to what as opposed to anarchy Khilafah simply meant Kings”
Mufti Abu Layth says there is no sahih hadith in which the Prophet spoke about homosexuals, that he does not believe the reports of Ali ordering executions to be authentic, and that the claim of a consensus that anyone who commits homosexual acts deserves death is false, since the jurists disagreed and the Hanafis held it is not a hadd.
“now people have started to say that there is ijma that these people have anybody who commits homosexuality deserves death this is what they're saying that is nonsense that is nonsense”
Mufti Abu Layth says the overwhelming majority of scholars held homosexual acts to be haram and he accepts that they are haram, while saying that the punishments scholars assigned varied between places and changed over time, that the people of Lut were destroyed primarily for rejecting their prophet, and that the ruling does not require hatred.
“most outright majority did say it's haram some did disagree so just being honest and being objective and transparent majority accepted it haram and we accept it's haram”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the Quran is ambivalent towards those who leave Islam and prescribes no killing of apostates, and that the report 'whoever changes his religion, kill him' rests solely on Ikrima, a Khariji whom Imam Malik and companions distrusted.
“really the attitude of the Quran is one of ambivalence it doesn't really care although people act like oh my god kill the apostate kill the apostate that's all nonsense”
Mufti Abu Layth says that this is unfortunately the state of Muslims and why they are a laughing stock.
“you would see the fire but you're just blowing into cold ashes this is the state of Muslims unfortunately you know so this is why we are a laughing stock”
Mufti Abu Layth says the medieval conversion of churches into mosques was not haram but the politics of the time, though he does not think it was a good thing.
“if they did it in the past I'm not saying it was haram it wasn't I suppose they've kind of conquered and this is what they did I don't think it was a good thing”
Mufti Abu Layth says there is no need for the Hagia Sophia as a mosque, since the Blue Mosque, holding at least ten thousand people, is a four-minute walk away.
“a four minute walk from the aya sofya a four minute walk four minutes that's how it is literally just in front of it right now there is no need for a new masjid”
Mufti Abu Layth says the Prophet's removal of the idols from the Kaaba, which were tied to superstition, cannot be linked to converting a museum in a secular country today.
“I'm absolutely again for removing superstition that you can't link that to today in a city in a country that first of all is not an Islamic country”
Mufti Abu Layth says Islam never set out to convert other religions' holy sites into mosques: Umar did not convert Jerusalem's churches, and Quran 22:40 counts monasteries, churches and synagogues among the places where Allah's name is glorified and which He protects.
“i don't think islam encourages you to convert holy sites into masjids so for example if we look at the the quran”
Mufti Abu Layth says the medieval conversion of churches into mosques and of mosques into cathedrals was the politics of men, neither encouraged nor prohibited by Islam, so the original conversion of the Hagia Sophia was not haram but was not a good thing.
“i'm not saying it was haram it wasn't i suppose they've kind of conquered and this is what they did i don't think it was a good thing”
Mufti Abu Layth says converting the Hagia Sophia back into a mosque is not a matter of halal and haram, since Turkey may legally do what it wants with its property, but is absolutely wrong and a great mistake, driven in his view by the regime's wish to lead the Islamic world.
“converting it into a masjid is absolutely wrong it is uh it is a great mistake that is being celebrated by people”
Mufti Abu Layth says the Ottoman Empire was a dynasty that happened to be Muslim and never claimed to be a symbol of Islam, styling its sultans 'Caesar of Rome' and practising mandatory fratricide, so Muslims who romanticise it as representing Islam are mistaken.
“the ottoman empire was never it was nothing more than a dynasty that just happened to be muslim it is not symbolic of islam”
Mufti Abu Layth says there is no need for the Hagia Sophia as a mosque, since the Blue Mosque, with room for at least ten thousand, is a four-minute walk away and hundreds of Istanbul mosques already call the adhan.
“there is no need for a new masjid we don't have a need first of all i'm just trying to eliminate that aspect there is no need”
Mufti Abu Layth says the reconversion is part of a rising right-wing fascism that includes Muslims, and that the waqf argument fails because Abu Hanifa himself held that an endowment can be overturned, a view Hanafis abandon when it does not serve the powerful or the clergy.
“he says that yes you can donate the benefits of something but it will always remain uh you know you can always overturn it”
Mufti Abu Layth says that, although Muslims generally do not accept such beliefs, a person claiming to be a prophet is not automatically insulting the Prophet.
“Now obviously as Muslims generally we don't accept these beliefs but it doesn't mean if somebody says that that they are automatically insulting the prophet”
Mufti Abu Layth says he does not believe it was known among the companions that the leaders would always be from Quraysh.
“There's a a popular understanding that the leaders will always be from Quraysh and somehow the companions all knew this. I don't buy any of that. I don't believe that was known”
Mufti Abu Layth says Ibn Taymiyya was imprisoned over his fatwa that one may not travel to visit the Prophet, an opinion he calls foolish but says should not be punished, since people should not be persecuted over religious differences.
“although i disagree with locking people up and stuff like that and i i do feel his opinion is dumb but i don't feel you can punish them over it”
Mufti Abu Layth says children are still accountable in their own way, commensurate with being a child, so the laws for them are more relaxed and less stringent than for adults.
“they would still be accountable in their own way you understand so naturally the laws pertaining to children would be more relaxed and more less stringent than they would to adults”
Mufti Abu Layth says a qadi's judgement would be not unlike how the courts work in England today, and that is how the Sharia would work, more or less.
“yes he would take into consideration the circumstances it would be very it would be not different from how the courts work let's say in england today that would be how the sharia would work i mean more or less”
Mufti Abu Layth says he feels the apostasy asked about was not a theological crisis but a case of being incentivised by the Makkans.
“he is rewarded generously for some of the intel that he provides and i feel that that was the situation it was just human all too human you know it wasn't a theological crisis”
Mufti Abu Layth says there is no obligation in Islam to establish a caliphate system, that classical Maliki scholars held this, so the claimed consensus fails, and that Akram Nadwi takes the same view.
“there's no such thing in islam as an obligation for a caliphate system”
How many of these answers cite each (guest speech left out). Cited means named as evidence or discussed, not necessarily accepted: open the answers to see which.
