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Dialogue and responses
575 segments in 131 recordings · 2014 to 2025 · 0 verified · 161 checked positions · dialogue
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Click a year to jump to itLatest answer · 18 Oct 2025
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestIs the Quran-only position an argument from epistemology or from principle?
The guest says the Quran-only position rests on principle, since God refers earlier communities only to their books, and is confirmed by epistemology, since hadith are contradictory and insulting; Quranists reject the religious authority of hadith, not history or narrations as such.
machine6 min 51 s18:31on YouTube
Earlier answers · 574 · newest first
2025 · 13
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Do Quranists accept any Sunnah of the Prophet?
Both agree the Quran is central, but the guest says the Quran names only two sunnahs, of earlier peoples and of God, and that the Prophet's own clarifications were not preserved and so cannot have been necessary; Mufti Abu Layth presents this as the school of Madinah's Quran-centred view with other sources orbiting it.
machine5 min 13 s24:01on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestIs the Prophet Muhammad the most beloved of creation and a mercy to the worlds?
The guest holds that God's sending of the messenger, not the Prophet himself, is the mercy, and that calling him the most beloved of creation is unprovable celebrity worship; Mufti Abu Layth says the Prophet is a mercy for the worlds and that if some are more beloved than others one must be at the top.
machine5 min27:42on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestDoes 'we sent you only as a mercy' (21:107) describe the Prophet or the act of sending him?
Mufti Abu Layth says the primary Arabic reading of 21:107 is that the Prophet himself was sent as a mercy for the worlds, with the exclusive negation amplifying that, while the guest's reading that the sending is the mercy is a secondary understanding he may hold but not impose.
machine10 min 54 s32:42on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhy did Mufti Abu Layth challenge hadith in BukhariGate, and can the Prophet be called the most beloved of creation?
Mufti Abu Layth says his hadith criticism, including BukhariGate, was driven by reports that insult the Prophet, whose honour comes before Muslims' own; the guest says calling the Prophet the most beloved of creation is unprovable and a lie against God, and that the Quran favours Abraham, whom Muhammad is told to follow.
machine7 min 13 s43:36on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhat is the 'wisdom' the Prophet teaches alongside the Book in 2:129?
The guest holds that the wisdom taught alongside the Book is the Quran's own application and is found in the Quran itself; Mufti Abu Layth says the primary reading of 2:129 is that the messenger teaches the Book and, separately, the wisdom, and himself purifies the people.
machine5 min 51 s51:35on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can 'light' in 5:15 refer to the Prophet, or only to guidance and the book?
Mufti Abu Layth says the primary readings of 'light' in 5:15 are guidance or the Prophet, as many mufassirun held, and that the guest's reading as the book is acceptable but may not negate the others; the guest says the word cannot refer to a human and that the mufassirun inserted the Prophet from presupposition.
machine9 min 01 s1:08:12on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestHow do Quranists perform Hajj and apply Islam without the fiqh tradition?
The guest says the application of Islam is all in the Quran: his group performs Hajj in months other than the usual days, since the Quran speaks of plural months, and Ramadan is fully detailed; he does not rely on the fatwa tradition.
machine2 min 45 s1:18:06on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestHow does a Quranist pray salah?
The guest's prayer has no unit count: after wudu he seeks refuge, reads al-Fatiha by his own choice and a full chapter, then prostrates once with supplication, filling the prayer time as the moment dictates; in congregation the imam leads a single long prostration and prayers last up to an hour, three times a day.
machine6 min 20 s1:19:58on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quranist prayer have any set structure?
The guest's prayer has no set structure: it changes in the moment, may include hours of prostration or prostrating mid-recitation when a verse moves him, and its purpose per 29:45 is to restrain immorality; he says Quranists may also pray like Sunnis, minus words not from God.
machine5 min 45 s1:31:46on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is it a sin to enjoy being praised?
The guest holds that 3:188 describes people buying into the worldly life, exulting in what they have and loving praise for what they have not done, and that such people are punished; pressed, he confirms that anyone with these traits faces punishment.
machine6 min 07 s2:04:39on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What is Mufti Abu Layth's case for keeping the Islamic scholarly tradition?
The guest restates Mufti Abu Layth's view as relying on the tradition for a few hard verses and says the Quran's overall message has no such problems; Mufti says the 1,400-year tradition beginning with the Prophet's Sunnah is invaluable and discarding it is a disservice to Islam.
machine5 min 10 s2:22:37on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhy do Quranists reject the Islamic tradition as a whole?
The guest says Quranists differ in interpretation but agree that the Islamic tradition is riddled with errors, and that Mufti Abu Layth's BukhariGate work leads people to Quranism; Mufti says the guest's own prayer choices came from the tradition and objects to disrespect towards the people of the mosque.
machine7 min 08 s2:26:38on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How should Muslims engage people with very different views of the religion?
Those with very different views still come from love for the religion, and the only way forward is dialogue and humanising one another; the guest says the Quran is the only thing that can unite Shia and Sunni, and both sign off warmly.
machine2 min 58 s2:46:26on YouTube
2023 · 3
22 Feb 2023video
LatestShould scholars publicly condemn a scholar said to have joined in a libation ritual?
Mufti Abu Layth does not think people have to condemn the scholar; to Mufti, pouring some water at a protest, as the scholar says he did without knowing the ritual's history, is not a big deal.
machine8 min 47 s5:12on YouTube
22 Feb 2023video
LatestShould Sunnis preach to Shia Muslims about what they get wrong?
Mufti Abu Layth says no: it only leads to sectarian fighting. Answer people who come asking, but Sunni-Shia debating does no good.
machine2 min 34 s36:24on YouTube
6 Feb 2023video
Is Engineer Muhammad Ali Mirza consistent in how he criticises hadith?
Not fully, says Mufti Abu Layth: Engineer Mirza's rational critique of others' hadith stops short of scrutinising how sahih hadith were authenticated. Mufti still calls him a legend and a much-needed voice.
machine8 min 28 s0:01on YouTube
2022 · 1
19 Feb 2022video
LatestWhat do you think of the rational readings of the Quran on the Marvelous Quran channel?
Mufti Abu Layth welcomes his fresh, reason-based approach to the Quran but does not agree with some readings he understood from him, such as Zakariya being the father of Jesus.
machine6 min 59 s0:00on YouTube
2021 · 179
22 Dec 2021video
What do Sunni Muslims think of the twelve Shia imams?
The Shia imams are generally respected in Sunni Islam but are not used as reference points; he suspects Ja'far al-Sadiq was closer to the Shia picture of him than Sunnis admit, as an assumption. Sunnis and Shia should agree to disagree and be fair to each other.
machine6 min 24 s0:00on YouTube
18 May 2021video
LatestStatement on the break-in at Mufti Abu Layth's home
Mufti Abu Layth describes masked men breaking into his home and terrifying his family, and asks whether this is the character Islam teaches.
machine1 min 21 s0:08on YouTube
18 May 2021video
Response to accusations over Palestine remarks and claims he is not Muslim
Mufti Abu Layth says he has always supported Palestine and only argued for safe passage for its people, that 'exile' was a slip of the tongue, and that those calling him a non-Muslim and invading his home are not following Islam.
machine7 min 38 s1:29on YouTube
17 May 2021video
LatestAre Bin Bayyah and Hamza Yusuf to blame for the UAE's deal with Israel?
No, in Mufti Abu Layth's view: the UAE's ruler does not take direction from scholars, Bin Bayyah is said to have disliked the treaty while deferring to the ruler's decision, and Hamza Yusuf had nothing to do with it. He opens with condolences for the losses in Gaza.
machine3 min 58 s1:22on YouTube
17 May 2021video
Why does Mufti Abu Layth compare the Palestinian situation to facing a knife?
His escrima teacher's rule was to run from a knife and fight only when running is impossible, and he applies it to an enemy that will not back down. He repeats that the UAE deal has brought nothing and that Bin Bayyah and Hamza Yusuf should not be blamed for it.
machine3 min 57 s18:30on YouTube
27 Apr 2021video
Does today's Hanafi madhhab reflect Imam Abu Hanifa?
Not in spirit: Mufti Abu Layth calls later Hanafi rulings fossilised and pedantic, behind the sectarian attacks on Shaykh Aslam, and praises Shaykh Atabek as a fresh voice.
machine4 min 23 s0:00on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What does Lupe Fiasco's name Wasalu mean, and how was he raised?
The guest says he has never confirmed what his name Wasalu means; Mufti Abu Layth suggests the Arabic 'to connect'. Born to convert parents, he says he was born Muslim.
machine3 min 38 s3:14on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What was Lupe Fiasco's childhood like?
The guest describes growing up in Chicago in a family of martial arts, music and engineering, giving up chess over a hadith, and turning to rap when he could not learn the clarinet.
machine7 min 43 s6:52on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How did Lupe Fiasco go from science to rap?
The guest says he wanted to be a rocket scientist but struggled with maths, and signed a record deal straight out of high school.
machine4 min 27 s15:14on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestDid Lupe Fiasco's way with words come naturally?
The guest says words did not come naturally: he trained himself by copying words from magazine covers into raps until metaphors and images came easily.
machine6 min 23 s19:40on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhat does Lupe Fiasco think the soul is?
The guest says exposure to many faiths has left him still searching, and that he thinks of the soul as a name for many functions of the body, holding his 'I don't know' comfortably.
machine5 min 50 s36:27on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How does the Chinese state deal with religion?
The guest describes Chinese paper offerings burned for the dead, a government crackdown on their modern forms, and the Anti-Spiritual Pollution Campaign as examples of the state managing religion.
machine8 min 59 s44:07on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What is Lupe Fiasco's view of Kanye West's religious rebirth?
The guest declines to judge Kanye West's faith, praising his work ethic while disagreeing with him, and calls Jay-Z a mentor and a genius with words.
machine4 min 28 s1:45:38on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What does Lupe Fiasco think of Killah Priest's song B.I.B.L.E.?
The guest calls Killah Priest's 'B.I.B.L.E.' an amazing record about a spiritual journey, noting that studying Islam's Jewish and Christian sources creates intellectual tension.
machine1 min 53 s1:52:06on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Lupe Fiasco know DMX?
The guest says he did not know DMX closely, and describes meeting Dave Chappelle.
machine1 min 19 s1:53:21on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How did Lupe Fiasco discover Mufti Abu Layth?
The guest says he found Mufti Abu Layth while looking for alternatives to the Salafi content that dominates Muslim YouTube, and values his different point of view.
machine3 min 10 s1:55:15on YouTube
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is Lupe Fiasco retiring from music?
The guest says he is not retiring but reorganising his life at forty around the metaphor of a garden, preparing for major technological change.
machine3 min 39 s1:58:29on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Responding to viewers' love: a grown-up child, and haters as a measure of impact
Mufti Abu Layth says he does not feel he deserves viewers' praise and reads his critics' obsession as a sign that they feel threatened by his ideas.
machine6 min 34 s14:53on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Reading supporters' messages: ease of deen, the Bukhari series, apostasy
Supporters' messages thank Mufti Abu Layth for making the deen easy and for his work on Bukhari, the age of Aisha and apostasy.
machine5 min 21 s24:08on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Humour as a natural gift
Mufti Abu Layth says humour comes naturally and cannot be faked, and that he asks serious interlocutors to excuse his.
machine1 min 19 s32:07on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How has the internet changed who gets to speak about Islam?
Mufti Abu Layth says the internet let him reach people without the backing of mosques or organisations, which would never have given him a platform.
machine3 min 57 s36:04on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestAre there answers to the hardest ethical questions about stories in the Quran?
Mufti Abu Layth says he has answered every hard question on his 2016 list, such as the killing of the boy in Moses' story, by research true to the text, and others can build on it.
machine7 min 49 s40:01on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhy are some clerics so hostile to Mufti Abu Layth?
Mufti Abu Layth says clerics who oppose him see in his approach the end of their institutional religion, and calls their reaction its final pangs.
machine3 min 58 s51:44on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
More messages: a middle path between Salafism and Quranism, and 'God is not dumb'
Supporters' messages describe finding a middle path between Salafism and Quranism and using the intellect in faith, and Mufti Abu Layth responds.
machine3 min 58 s1:14:11on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How should I deal with online hate preachers?
Mufti Abu Layth says critics who use him for views, especially hate preachers, should be mocked and blocked, and that their obsession harms them more than him.
machine6 min 35 s1:32:53on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhere are the answers to the questions on the Jesus debate?
Mufti Abu Layth says most of the Jesus debate questions are answered in his long reply, and that the shaykh he answered has substance but is torn between his views and his following.
machine2 min 37 s1:39:28on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Can critics cancel an independent preacher?
Mufti Abu Layth says efforts to cancel him cannot work, because he is independent and speaks to the silent majority of ordinary Muslims, not his critics' followers.
machine3 min 56 s1:42:05on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWill Mufti Abu Layth invite his critics onto MindTrap?
Yes: Mufti Abu Layth says he has invited many of his critics onto MindTrap for respectful dialogue, but not hate preachers or extremists.
machine2 min 39 s1:48:40on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Dr Abdul Majid refute Mufti Abu Layth's BukhariGate arguments?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says Dr Abdul Majid accepted Bukhari because other scholars had and did not answer the points on its transmission, though he respects him for having the dialogue.
machine6 min 37 s1:53:57on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Adnan Ibrahim?
Mufti Abu Layth admires Adnan Ibrahim as a voice of reason in the Arabic-speaking world whose message is close to his own and who is what a real imam should be.
machine2 min 38 s1:59:15on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Jealousy, entitlement and the critics who resent his following
Mufti Abu Layth says much of the hostility he receives comes from jealousy and a sense of entitlement among critics who resent his following.
machine6 min 28 s36:02on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Mufti Abu Layth say incest is natural, and is homosexuality unnatural?
Mufti Abu Layth never said incest is natural. He says that calling homosexuality unnatural is not scientific because it occurs in most species, though one may still hold it haram, and that he cited Imam Malik only for not interfering in other people's way of life.
machine9 min 32 s56:10on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How often does Mufti Abu Layth change his views, and is that a weakness?
Mufti Abu Layth changes his views when evidence is compelling and says developing one's opinions over life is a sign of intelligence, not weakness. He advises viewers to do the same.
machine6 min 14 s1:35:40on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How was Mufti Abu Layth's video on Aisha's age received?
Mufti Abu Layth is proud of the video: many people, especially women, told him it brought them back to Islam, while most clergy resent it because questioning the inherited ruling threatens their authority and livelihood.
machine8 min 09 s1:42:34on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What does Yasir Qadhi argue about Malikis and the return of Jesus?
Yasir Qadhi argues in the clip that the return of Jesus is established by mutawatir hadith and affirmed by the great Maliki scholars, so a Maliki cannot deny it. Mufti Abu Layth sets out the points he will answer.
machine4 min 20 s2:13:03on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Imam Malik believe Jesus will return?
There is a statement from Imam Malik that Jesus died, and Malik never taught the second coming in his fatwas or the Muwatta, so it is no huge claim that he did not hold it. Transmitting a report is not endorsing it.
machine7 min 42 s2:17:23on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Are the signs of the Hour part of Islamic creed?
One can be a Maliki and doubt these reports: Ibn Ashur, Shaykh al-Islam of the Malikis, classed the signs of the Hour as information rather than creed, and Imam Ahmad said the malahim reports have no foundation.
machine7 min 06 s2:51:30on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why does Mufti Abu Layth say it is not a huge claim that Imam Malik denied the second coming?
Malik's record and Ibn Ashur's standing show a Maliki can deny the second coming, and the Dajjal reports insult the Prophet. He invites Qadhi to a dialogue on MindTrap.
machine8 min 12 s2:58:36on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
A critic's reaction video: the Wahhabi jibe and the setup
Mufti Abu Layth introduces a critic's reaction video that he says distorts his views, and trades jokes about the label Wahhabi.
machine4 min 08 s3:06:48on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestDoes Mufti Abu Layth have any scholarly precedent for his views?
His views have respected precedents: al-Burzuli, a Maliki Shaykh al-Islam, held that punishments change with the age, and the subcontinent scholars he quotes were Ahl al-Hadith, not heretics. Not every untrue statement is a sin punished with hell.
machine3 min 50 s3:10:56on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Noah really live 950 years?
Noah's 950 years refers to an ancient counting system like those of the Sumerian king lists, signalled by the verse's unusual wording, not to ordinary years; he never said the Quran copied an error from the Bible.
machine4 min 30 s3:15:33on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Was Solomon's hudhud really a bird?
The hudhud is addressed in Arabic forms used only for humans, so Mufti Abu Layth reads it as a person, perhaps an agent of Solomon's intelligence service, and he rejects a reading that makes a prophet steal a throne.
machine4 min 27 s3:36:01on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Jesus survive the crucifixion?
Mufti Abu Layth reads the cradle verse as the priests' indignation at being debated by a boy, and says Jesus was taken down from the cross alive after a few hours, which he finds more plausible than a substitute transformed to look like him.
machine4 min 38 s3:40:28on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Donors, deathbed remarks and 'no hatred': an invitation to the critic
Mufti Abu Layth says he dislikes his critics' conduct but has no hatred for them, and invites the critic to a dialogue on MindTrap.
machine7 min 44 s3:45:06on YouTube
16 Mar 2021video
What does the Mufti think of Shaykh Dedew?
Mufti Abu Layth has a soft spot for Shaykh Dedew and finds some of his fatawa very interesting, though he is critical in some things and dogmatic in others. Take the critical things from him and stay open-minded on the dogmatic ones.
machine1 min 25 s0:00on YouTube
15 Mar 2021video
Is Mufti Abu Layth a Mu'tazili?
Mufti Abu Layth is not a Mu'tazili because he is Sunni. The Mu'tazila were an early faction defined by their view of sinners, and calling them 'super rationalists' is later Sunni propaganda.
machine2 min 23 s0:01on YouTube
15 Mar 2021video
What actually separates Sunnis and Shia, and is mut'ah really a Shia thing?
The Sunni-Shia split is only about who has the right to rule, the Shia holding it stays in the Prophet's bloodline. Mut'ah and wiping the feet have nothing to do with being Shia; Sunnis used them as propaganda.
machine4 min 34 s2:24on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Opening: Qadhi's post on the drama of refutations and tonight's plan
Yasir Qadhi has complained about refutations; Mufti Abu Layth says ideas, not people, are being refuted and that tonight's session will reply to Qadhi's video on the second coming of Jesus.
machine2 min 43 s0:03on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Which Quranic verses does Yasir Qadhi say point to the return of Jesus?
Qadhi's clip cites three or four Quranic phrases, Jesus speaking in maturity, the People of the Book believing before his death, and Jesus as a sign of the Hour, and concedes they only strongly suggest a return. Mufti Abu Layth interjects that the sign of the Hour would then have come two thousand years ago.
machine7 min 48 s2:46on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
What does Yasir Qadhi claim about the hadith on Jesus's return being mutawatir?
Qadhi's clip claims the hadith of the return are too numerous to discount, narrated from about ten companions, held to be mutawatir and found in dozens of theological works, including those of the Maliki school's leading figures. Mufti Abu Layth responds with sarcasm and says the reply is still to come.
machine5 min 16 s10:34on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Do those who deny Jesus's return reject the unseen, as Yasir Qadhi claims?
Mufti Abu Layth rejects Qadhi's charge that deniers of the return refuse the unseen: belief itself concerns the unseen God, and Mufti is preoccupied with consciousness, which science cannot explain and which he understands to be non-local. Qadhi's clip names Mufti among the heretics.
machine3 min 53 s22:25on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Is distinguishing the Sunnah from hadith a modernist invention?
Mufti Abu Layth says distinguishing hadith from the Sunnah is the teaching of the madhhabs and of Imam Malik, not an invention of Muhammad Abduh, and that he does not treat Bukhari as special but judges every hadith by the same criteria. Qadhi's clip calls this separation a bigger problem than denying Jesus's return.
machine3 min 59 s26:18on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
What does Yasir Qadhi say about the claim that the return of Jesus came from Judeo-Christian sources?
Qadhi's clip calls the claim that the return of Jesus entered Islam from Judeo-Christian sources through Wahb, Ka'b or al-Zuhri a preposterous charge without evidence that would mean the faith was corrupted and the ummah misguided for fourteen centuries. Mufti Abu Layth asks listeners to remember these words.
machine2 min 34 s30:17on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
How does Yasir Qadhi answer the objection that Jesus killing pigs and refusing jizya makes no sense?
Qadhi's clip concedes that one early authority held Jesus died a natural death, and answers the objection that the return reports are irrational, Jesus killing pigs and refusing jizya, with 'Allah said so' and the claim that there will be no middle category between Islam and the Dajjal.
machine2 min 39 s32:51on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Was Yasir Qadhi's video on the return of Jesus an academic discussion?
Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi's video, announced as academic, ended by fabricating a modernist-school narrative and declaring deniers heretics guilty of bid'ah, which he calls a preachy khutbah rather than academic discussion.
machine2 min 37 s35:30on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
What did Yasir Qadhi himself say about problematic signs of the Hour such as Gog and Magog?
Mufti Abu Layth plays Qadhi's earlier talk calling Gog and Magog the most problematic sign of the Hour and a cause of people leaving Islam. He accuses Qadhi of half truths, such as omitting that the Maliki authorities held the Jesus reports unestablished, and says a Jesus who descends from the sky to chase pigs is a reasonable thing to question.
machine5 min 17 s38:07on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Does the Muslim account of the Mahdi, Jesus and Gog and Magog parallel Jewish messianic literature?
Qadhi's own clip lays out the Midrash's two messiahs, Gog and Magog and judgement, notes the parallel with the Muslim Mahdi, Messiah and Gog and Magog, and suggests both traditions simply had it. Mufti Abu Layth responds with sarcasm and notes Qadhi's admission that Muslim books contain bizarre material.
machine3 min 55 s43:24on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Did Yasir Qadhi himself say a hadith came into Islam from Jewish sources through Abu Hurayra?
Qadhi's clip endorses Ibn Kathir's view that the Gog and Magog report is defective and came from Israelite material through Abu Hurayra and Ka'b al-Ahbar. Mufti Abu Layth calls this hypocrisy, since Qadhi called the same claim about the Jesus reports preposterous.
machine2 min 37 s47:19on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
What is Yasir Qadhi's zombie theory about Gog and Magog?
Qadhi's clip calls a hidden tribe of billions ludicrous and floats, through a friend, the idea that Gog and Magog could be zombie-like humans. Mufti Abu Layth responds with jokes and introduces Qadhi's answer to the Google Earth objection.
machine5 min 23 s49:56on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Is Yasir Qadhi consistent about whether Gog and Magog could be hidden underground?
In one clip Qadhi says it is not impossible, since Allah is all-powerful and Ibn Taymiyya's rule allows what astounds the mind, that thousands live underground; in another he says he cannot believe a tribe has been trapped for four thousand years. Mufti Abu Layth asks where the consistency is.
machine2 min 40 s55:19on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
What has Yasir Qadhi said about challenging the giants of the Islamic tradition?
A clip circulated by a critic shows Qadhi saying that even the giants' views should not matter to a true researcher and that scholarship has become regurgitation. Mufti Abu Layth notes that the critic accuses Qadhi of exactly what Qadhi accuses Mufti of.
machine3 min 58 s57:59on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Did Yasir Qadhi say that majority scholarly opinion rests on socio-political factors?
In the clip Qadhi says correct opinion is independent of the names and number of scholars and that dominant positions rest on socio-political factors such as the Ghaznavids, the Hanbalis of Baghdad and the Seljuks. Mufti Abu Layth says this is exactly what modernists say and contradicts Qadhi's appeal to the giants on the return of Jesus.
machine3 min 57 s1:01:57on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Does Yasir Qadhi hold that even positions in aqidah lie within a spectrum of opinion?
In the clip Qadhi says that even in aqidah positions lie within a spectrum, that absorbing one's teachers' view does not make it true, and that no scholar's word is evidence in itself. Mufti Abu Layth says this sits ill with Qadhi declaring him a heretic for departing from the majority on the return of Jesus.
machine3 min 54 s1:05:54on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Is there really ijma that Jesus will return, and did Muhammad Abduh invent the denial?
Mufti Abu Layth says none of Qadhi's claims hold: not one of the hundred narrations is sound, Ibn Hazm recorded Muslim disagreement on the return nine centuries ago, major creed works omit it, and the Maliki authorities Qadhi cites held the reports not to be mutawatir. He announces a reply series, Disclosure with a big D.
machine5 min 13 s1:09:48on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Is separating hadith from the Sunnah a Hanafi and Maliki principle, and what does Mufti Abu Layth say about Salafi creed?
Distinguishing hadith from the Sunnah is the usul of the Hanafi and Maliki schools, not Abduh's invention, and Qadhi applies to Gog and Magog the very reasoning he condemns in others. Mufti Abu Layth adds that Salafi kalam rests on fabricated chains, such as companions debating whether the Quran is created, a debate that arose only around 190 to 210 AH.
machine5 min 12 s1:15:01on YouTube
14 Mar 2021video
Is there a single hadith on Jesus's return with an unproblematic chain?
Every chain Mufti Abu Layth examined for the strongest reports in Bukhari and Muslim contains a criticised narrator, so Qadhi's claim that they leave no doubt fails; accepting a report because al-Bukhari included it, while ignoring critics who were his equals or seniors, is arbitrary.
machine5 min 13 s1:57:02on YouTube
10 Mar 2021video
LatestCan I have a close non-Muslim friend and answer his salam?
Mufti Abu Layth rejects as ignorance and nonsense the view that a Muslim cannot have a close non-Muslim friend or return his greeting. Assim al-Hakeem's answer in the clip, that only acquaintances are allowed and a non-Muslim's salam gets a smile at most, is the view being replied to.
machine5 min 20 s2:37on YouTube
10 Mar 2021video
Reply to Mufti Mangera on ear piercing: who defines normal and decent?
A played clip of Mufti Mangera allowing one or two ear piercings as 'normal' among decent people but not higher ones, which Mufti Abu Layth mocks for leaving undefined who decides what is normal.
machine3 min 40 s0:00on YouTube
10 Mar 2021video
Reply to Mufti Mangera: does the ban on muthla forbid piercing?
The clip cites the ban on muthla (mutilation) against piercing; Mufti Abu Layth explains that muthla means disfiguring bodies, especially of the dead, and mocks applying it to ear piercing.
machine3 min 57 s3:40on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWas Ali born inside the Kaaba?
It may have happened but is uncertain, and most likely means the homes of Banu Hashim attached to the Kaaba rather than the cube itself; Ali's greatness does not depend on it.
machine6 min 27 s16:03on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Do I have to believe Umar and Uthman were better than Ali?
No: preferring one close companion over another is a personal preference, and he calls arguing over the ranking childish; treating Ali as infallible is equally wrong.
machine2 min 37 s21:49on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the great love Muslims have for the Prophet a kind of prophet worship?
Muslims' love for the Prophet is not prophet worship: people need a human figure to love, and for Muslims it is the Prophet, though praying to him is wrong. He strongly disagrees with the shaykh and calls it an unnecessary battle.
machine8 min 56 s48:28on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Qadhi's post on the 'drama of refutations', and tonight's reply
Mufti Abu Layth says Yasir Qadhi, who complained of the drama of refutations, cannot change the rules after his clips on the second coming of Jesus, and introduces his reply.
machine2 min 38 s1:03:51on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Which Quranic verses does Yasir Qadhi say point to Jesus coming back?
In the clip Qadhi says three verses strongly suggest Jesus's return; Mufti Abu Layth mocks the readings and says the return is not in the Quran.
machine7 min 27 s1:06:29on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Are the hadith about Jesus's return mutawatir, as Yasir Qadhi claims?
In the clip Qadhi says the hadith on Jesus's return are mutawatir, found in dozens of tafsir and creed works and held by the Maliki authorities; Mufti Abu Layth answers with sarcasm.
machine5 min 44 s1:13:56on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Do people who deny Jesus's return reject the unseen?
Mufti Abu Layth rejects Qadhi's charge that deniers of the return reject the unseen: belief itself is in the unseen God, and he is himself preoccupied with consciousness, which science cannot explain.
machine3 min 07 s1:26:08on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is distinguishing the Sunnah from hadith a modernist invention?
Qadhi calls the hadith-Sunnah distinction a modernist invention worse than denying the return; Mufti Abu Layth says it is what the madhhabs and Imam Malik actually teach, and that Bukhari is not beyond criticism.
machine4 min 32 s1:29:15on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What does Yasir Qadhi say about the return of Jesus coming from Jewish and Christian sources?
In the clip Qadhi calls the claim that the return came from Judeo-Christian sources baseless and says it would destroy Islamic epistemology; Mufti Abu Layth marks his words for later.
machine2 min 43 s1:33:47on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How does Yasir Qadhi answer the objection that Jesus killing pigs makes no sense?
In the clip Qadhi admits one early authority held that Jesus died, and answers objections to Jesus killing pigs and refusing the jizya with 'Allah said so'.
machine2 min 36 s1:36:30on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Was Yasir Qadhi's lecture on Jesus's return really academic?
Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi's lecture, billed as academic, ended by branding deniers of the return innovators and heretics, making it a preachy Friday sermon rather than an academic discussion.
machine3 min1:39:06on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is Yasir Qadhi giving the whole picture on the Maliki scholars and Jesus's return?
Using Qadhi's own talk on Gog and Magog, Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi tells half truths, citing the Maliki authorities without their view that the hadith on Jesus are not conclusively established.
machine4 min 30 s1:42:06on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Do Muslim beliefs about the Mahdi, Jesus and Gog and Magog mirror Jewish messianic texts?
In the clip Qadhi sets out the Jewish belief in a minor and a major messiah alongside Gog and Magog, mirroring Muslim end-time beliefs; Mufti Abu Layth mocks his 'what a coincidence'.
machine3 min 50 s1:46:36on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Yasir Qadhi himself say a hadith came into Islam from Jewish lore?
Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi is inconsistent: he calls Israelite origins for the return preposterous, yet with Ibn Kathir firmly believes the Gog and Magog report came from Israelite lore through Abu Hurayra's circle.
machine3 min 03 s1:50:26on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What is Yasir Qadhi's zombie theory of Gog and Magog?
In the clip Qadhi rejects a hidden tribe of Gog and Magog as irrational and floats a zombie theory instead, which Mufti Abu Layth mocks.
machine4 min 07 s1:53:29on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Has Yasir Qadhi been consistent about whether Gog and Magog could be hidden underground?
Mufti Abu Layth sets an older Qadhi clip defending the Gog and Magog hadith as 'not impossible' against his later statement that he cannot believe it.
machine4 min 13 s1:57:36on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Has Yasir Qadhi said that the views of great scholars should not bind a researcher?
Mufti Abu Layth plays a clip of Qadhi urging researchers to break from inherited scholarship, and notes that the critic sharing it accuses Qadhi of the modernism Qadhi charges others with.
machine3 min 16 s2:01:49on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the majority of scholars holding a view make it right?
Mufti Abu Layth shows Qadhi saying that majority opinion rests on socio-political factors and that numbers do not make a view right, against his own appeal to the giants on the second coming.
machine4 min 09 s2:05:05on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Can positions in aqidah fall within a range of scholarly opinion?
Mufti Abu Layth shows Qadhi teaching that even aqidah positions lie on a spectrum and that no scholar's word is evidence in itself, while calling Mufti a heretic for departing from the majority.
machine3 min 38 s2:09:14on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is there really scholarly consensus that Jesus will return?
Mufti Abu Layth rejects Qadhi's claims one by one: the Quran does not suggest a return, no narration is sound, Ibn Hazm recorded disagreement on it, and the Maliki authorities did not hold the reports to be mutawatir.
machine5 min 21 s2:12:52on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is separating hadith from the Sunnah a Hanafi and Maliki principle?
The hadith-Sunnah distinction is Hanafi and Maliki usul, not Abduh's invention; Mufti Abu Layth lists Qadhi's inconsistencies and says Salafi kalam rests on fabricated chains.
machine5 min 03 s2:18:13on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is there a single hadith on Jesus's return with a flawless chain?
Every chain he examined among the strongest Bukhari and Muslim reports, including that of al-Nawwas ibn Sam'an, has a criticised narrator, so Qadhi's 'no doubt' fails; preferring al-Bukhari over equal critics is arbitrary.
machine5 min 49 s3:00:24on YouTube
2 Mar 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is Mohammed Hijab breaking away from the Salafis?
Mufti Abu Layth thinks Hijab's point against the fatwa is fair, though his language was crude and not Mufti's style, and welcomes what he sees as Hijab outgrowing Salafism.
machine6 min 20 s3:27:30on YouTube
22 Feb 2021video
Abdul Rahman Hassan's clip: the first Khariji, protest, and never criticising rulers
Mufti Abu Layth plays and mocks a clip in which Abdul Rahman Hassan presents protest against rulers as the mentality of the first Khariji, reading it as a defence of the Saudi rulers.
machine5 min 28 s0:02on YouTube
22 Feb 2021video
Did the Prophet say he would kill the lineage of the first Khariji?
Mufti Abu Layth says the speaker, carried away defending the Saudi rulers, attributed to the Prophet words he did not say: in the hadith the Prophet stopped Umar from killing the man. Respect for the Prophet comes before kings.
machine4 min 31 s6:10on YouTube
22 Feb 2021video
An invitation to MindTrap on aqidah and Bukhari, and an open challenge to Salafi imams
Mufti Abu Layth invites Abdul Rahman Hassan, and any Salafi imam, to discuss aqidah or Bukhari on MindTrap, challenging them to prove the Salafi creed from the Quran and Sunnah alone.
machine3 min 22 s10:01on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Will you give talks in Mirpuri?
No, he says he could not give talks in Mirpuri; his audience is the younger community, and others already serve the elderly in that language.
machine2 min 34 s4:56on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Tonight's clips under the microscope, and a project coming soon
Mufti Abu Layth previews the clips he will respond to tonight, on ear piercing, non-Muslim friends, the Khawarij and drugs, and says a new project is coming soon.
machine3 min 36 s7:30on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Where are most of the Mufti's viewers from?
His analytics show most of his viewers are in the UK, he says, though the live audience seems to be mostly Canadian and American because of the late hour.
machine1 min 56 s21:38on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why isn't the Mufti a Mu'tazili?
Mufti Abu Layth says he is simply Sunni; sects are defined by core doctrines, the Shia by the sacred bloodline's right to rule, and mut'ah was pinned on them as propaganda.
machine6 min 48 s44:58on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What does the Mufti think of Fethullah Gulen?
Mufti Abu Layth says he knows little about Gulen beyond his influential network of schools with an Islamic ethos, and will read up on him.
machine1 min 09 s59:27on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is following the Sunnah like believing in the Trinity?
No: following the Sunnah is of course not akin to the Trinity.
machine1 min 08 s1:16:17on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
A prospective MindTrap guest who has gone quiet
A planned MindTrap conversation with a speaker who offered to come on was postponed, and Mufti Abu Layth has not heard back since.
machine1 min 17 s1:25:03on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the Prophet tell people to drink camel urine as medicine?
Mufti Abu Layth says camel urine is not medicine and the Prophet never really told anyone to drink it; the report is weak in its chain and, if taken at all, reads as a rebuke.
machine6 min 30 s1:26:20on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why is quoting science to defend hadith like camel urine risky?
Mufti Abu Layth says Hijab cannot yet leave his Salafi audience, and that using science to prove absurd claims usually backfires, as with camel-urine research and earlier polemics.
machine5 min 47 s1:32:50on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
A mufti's clip on ear piercing: 'decency', 'manipulation' and muthla
Mufti Abu Layth mocks a mufti's argument that piercing beyond the earlobe is abnormal and amounts to muthla, saying muthla means disfiguring a body, not piercing it.
machine7 min 45 s1:53:05on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Can a Muslim have a close non-Muslim friend?
Mufti Abu Layth calls the teaching that Muslims cannot have close non-Muslim friends ignorance and venom that makes the deen suffer.
machine5 min 30 s2:03:51on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the Prophet say he would kill the first Khariji's descendants?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Prophet never said 'I will kill his lineage'; in the Bukhari report he stopped Umar from killing the man, so the clip misrepresents the Prophet to defend rulers.
machine10 min 37 s2:13:51on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
An open challenge: defend Salafi aqidah from the Quran alone
Mufti Abu Layth repeats his open challenge to Abdul Rahman Hassan and any Salafi imam to defend Salafi aqidah from the Quran alone, on MindTrap.
machine3 min 04 s2:16:57on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What does the Mufti think of Shaykh Dedew, and did Imam Ahmad dislike Abu Hanifa?
Imam Ahmad did say harsh things about Abu Hanifa, he says; of Shaykh Dedew, take his critical views and stay open-minded on his dogmatic ones.
machine2 min 25 s2:24:25on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Who are the Ibadis and what does the Mufti think of them?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Ibadis, an early and now peaceful offshoot of the Khawarij based in Oman, give a third tradition by which to cross-check claims, such as the Petra thesis.
machine6 min 22 s2:31:10on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Abu Hanifa allow nabidh only as medicine?
Mufti Abu Layth says the reports Abu Hanifa's school transmitted, of Umar and Ibn Mas'ud drinking and diluting nabidh, are about drinking with food, not medicine.
machine12 min 25 s2:47:32on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is cannabis an intoxicant like alcohol in Islam?
Mufti Abu Layth says marijuana is not an intoxicant in the way alcohol is, and accuses the preacher of not understanding the difference between psychoactive substances and intoxicants.
machine5 min 26 s2:55:00on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
The preacher on DMT: 'no proof of the unseen', and tahajjud instead
Mufti Abu Layth ridicules the preacher's claim that there is no scientific proof DMT users reach the unseen, asking what such proof could even look like.
machine6 min2:59:48on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is drinking poison haram in Islam?
Drinking poison is categorically haram, he says, so it is inconsistent to call DMT haram while justifying publicly drinking poison.
machine3 min 35 s3:10:59on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Sign-off: subscribe, the Discord coming soon, take the chance
Mufti Abu Layth closes the stream with reminders to subscribe and a note that the Discord is on its way.
machine46 s3:17:40on YouTube
15 Feb 2021video
Why does Bukhari accept a narrator who praised Ali's killer while Shia narrators are rejected?
Mufti Abu Layth calls it a double standard that al-Bukhari accepts as trustworthy a narrator who praised Ibn Muljam for killing Ali, while reports from Imam Jafar and other Shia imams are rejected because of their source.
machine3 min 33 s0:00on YouTube
14 Feb 2021video
Do Muslims have to believe that Jesus will come back?
Mufti Abu Layth rejects the hadith of Jesus returning as a judge who offers Islam or the sword, saying it came from Christian belief and clashes with the Quran's no compulsion in religion.
machine8 min 12 s0:01on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Yasir Qadhi's mugs and Bollywood lines: do his critics watch him?
Mufti Abu Layth plays a clip of Yasir Qadhi with branded mugs and wonders aloud how closely his critics watch him.
machine3 min 41 s49:37on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What qualifications does Mufti Abu Layth have?
Mufti Abu Layth lists degrees in psychology and education, an alim and mufti course and ijazahs, but says degrees mean little to him.
machine3 min 03 s1:07:37on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Debate invitations to Abdul Rahman Hassan and 'Danny boy'
Mufti Abu Layth invites Abdul Rahman Hassan to defend Salafi creed and 'Danny boy' to define ijma', saying critics pick on Shabir Ally instead.
machine9 min 38 s1:12:41on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What happened between Mufti Abu Layth and a Moroccan shaykh?
Mufti Abu Layth says a Moroccan shaykh he once visited later called him deviant, and he responded by pointing to the shaykh's past conviction.
machine5 min 49 s2:15:07on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is Mufti Abu Layth a feminist?
Mufti Abu Layth says he would like to think he is a feminist, though feminists seem not to like him.
machine2 min 36 s2:45:32on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Clips: three critics' videos attacking Shabir Ally
Mufti Abu Layth plays and mocks videos in which three critics attack Shabir Ally's views, including his view on hudud.
machine11 min 43 s2:48:08on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why do critics keep attacking Shabir Ally?
Mufti Abu Layth says the critics target Shabir Ally as a soft target who will not hit back, and repeats his offer to debate them.
machine6 min2:59:51on YouTube
9 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Maliki scholars really allow fines instead of hudud punishments?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Maliki fatwa allowing punishment through wealth was the work of a major scholar and was practised as law for centuries, not a forgotten opinion.
machine10 min 26 s3:05:51on YouTube
2 Feb 2021video
Did Ibn Ashur say Muslims must believe Jesus was raised alive?
Mufti Abu Layth shows that Ibn Ashur, quoted in Shadee Elmasry's post, held only that Jesus was not killed or crucified and was raised and saved, leaving how it happened open to interpretation.
machine8 min6:15on YouTube
2 Feb 2021video
Did Ibn Ashur say nothing in the Quran goes against the second coming of Jesus?
Mufti Abu Layth says Ibn Ashur wrote that the Quran does not deal with the second coming, not that nothing in it opposes it; the post confused yata'arrad with a verb meaning 'to oppose'.
machine7 min 50 s15:02on YouTube
2 Feb 2021video
Did Shadee Elmasry mistranslate Ibn Ashur on purpose?
Mufti Abu Layth says the mistranslation shows either incompetence in Arabic or deliberate misleading.
machine1 min 53 s21:10on YouTube
29 Jan 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What is Shaykh Atabek Shukurov working on, and why does he teach principles before rulings?
The guest says his main work is separating inherited culture from religion and teaching principles before detailed rulings, alongside a college of traditional medicine and writing books.
machine3 min 40 s3:03on YouTube
29 Jan 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How did Shaykh Atabek Shukurov become a scholar?
The guest traces his path from a Soviet childhood through Karachi and Saudi Arabia to eight years in Syria, where he learned to compare inherited cultures with the classical texts.
machine6 min 49 s6:17on YouTube
29 Jan 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How do people react when a scholar from Uzbekistan challenges subcontinent scholars?
Mufti Abu Layth says UK Islam comes almost wholly from Indo-Pakistani and Saudi culture; the guest says challenging subcontinent scholars from Uzbekistan draws harsh reactions, but open-minded people keep him going.
machine4 min 31 s15:01on YouTube
29 Jan 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestIs a mortgage riba?
The guest says a mortgage is not riba because the bank acts as an agent buying a specific house and then sells it on in instalments; riba is only a free loan repaid with extra.
machine7 min 51 s25:59on YouTube
29 Jan 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What happened when Shaykh Atabek wrote to Mufti Taqi Usmani about mortgages?
The guest says his respectful open letter to Mufti Taqi Usmani on mortgages got no reply, only an abusive reaction from students, which he does not think the mufti ordered.
machine5 min 45 s33:53on YouTube
29 Jan 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Could a senior scholar ever publicly change his fatwa on mortgages?
Mufti Abu Layth doubts the jurist could ever publicly accept the guest's view; the guest says almost no scholar is fully independent of politics, audience or salary.
machine7 min 11 s40:13on YouTube
29 Jan 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What does Shaykh Atabek think of his debate on the Isha time?
The guest says his much-watched exchange on the Isha time was not a real debate, since his opponent never addressed his proofs.
machine3 min 56 s1:24:53on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Will the Mufti open an academy to train muftis?
No: he says founding an institution drains one's life and takes away the freedom to think and speak, and that online teaching and books reach more people.
machine5 min 15 s30:45on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What does the Mufti think of Pir Naseeruddin Naseer?
Mufti Abu Layth says Pir Naseeruddin Naseer was a widely respected authority across the spectrum of Sunnis.
machine1 min 20 s1:15:25on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the debate with Dr Abdullah Abdul Majid answer the BukhariGate challenge?
Mufti Abu Layth says the discussion did not settle BukhariGate but strengthened it, since doubts about the book's transmission mean reports contradicting reason or the Quran should be set aside.
machine5 min 14 s1:16:45on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How did the BukhariGate discussion go on manuscripts and problematic hadith?
Mufti Abu Layth says the guest did not contest the manuscript evidence, and that defending the problematic reports amounts to claiming the Prophet could err but al-Bukhari could not.
machine10 min 29 s1:21:59on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is Mufti Abu Layth against Imam Bukhari?
No: he says he respects al-Bukhari as an outstanding hadith scholar, though not infallible, but holds that the book reaching us was altered in transmission, so troubling reports deserve caution.
machine5 min 17 s1:32:28on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
An invitation to Sunni Defence, bad blood with Farid, and interrupting in debates
Mufti Abu Layth invites a presenter of Sunni Defence to discuss BukhariGate on MindTrap, describes the bad blood with Farid, and defends occasional interruptions in debate.
machine6 min 32 s1:37:45on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
The snowman fatwas: building a snowman as an idol, or permitted by the dolls hadith
Mufti Abu Layth plays and mocks two fatwas on snowmen, one calling them idols and one permitting them by a hadith about dolls, saying such reasoning makes Muslims a laughing stock.
machine6 min 49 s1:45:37on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Would the Mufti make peace with Farid?
Mufti Abu Layth says he holds no hatred for Farid and would return respect if shown it, but answers public takfir against him with mockery and sees no reason to stop.
machine3 min 56 s1:52:26on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Was docetism about someone else being crucified in Jesus's place?
No: he says docetism was a debate over whether Jesus was truly human, and that the Quran says the crucifixion only appeared to succeed, not that a look-alike was crucified.
machine10 min 31 s2:31:42on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What does the Mufti think of Dr Umar Faruq Abdullah?
Mufti Abu Layth calls Dr Umar Faruq Abdullah exceptionally talented, with remarkable Arabic, but says his later turn to a pir-style spiritual role wastes that talent.
machine6 min 33 s2:40:53on YouTube
26 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Dawah Man on intimacy positions, citing Ibn al-Qayyim, played and mocked
Mufti Abu Layth plays and mocks a preacher's advice, attributed to Ibn al-Qayyim, against the woman-on-top position as encouraging femininity in men.
machine6 min 33 s2:59:20on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Will you discuss reincarnation with a guest on Mind Trap?
Mufti Abu Layth is still looking for the right guest to discuss reincarnation on Mind Trap, and has only skimmed the Shia response a viewer mentions.
machine3 min 26 s12:21on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Will you ever do a Mind Trap with Mohammed Hijab?
Mufti Abu Layth would welcome Mohammed Hijab on Mind Trap but doubts he would risk it, and would be glad to host Shaykh Imran Hosein.
machine3 min 41 s21:27on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Does joking and laughing a lot mean I lack high aspiration?
Mufti Abu Layth rejects a preacher's claim that joking and laughing show low aspiration, calling laughter the very definition of happiness and joy.
machine4 min 49 s29:53on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Who is Dr Abdul Majid, your Mind Trap guest?
Mufti Abu Layth will discuss BukhariGate with Dr Abdul Majid on Mind Trap, despite past hostile videos, and hopes it will be positive.
machine8 min 59 s47:58on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why don't you open an Islamic academy?
Mufti Abu Layth will not open an academy because he feels institutions consume their founders and religion is a hard market to sustain one in.
machine3 min 08 s1:35:18on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Has Zaytuna College limited what Hamza Yusuf can say?
Mufti Abu Layth says Hamza Yusuf's rise was remarkable but that Zaytuna now constrains him, so he avoids anything controversial; Mufti prefers his own freedom.
machine6 min 20 s1:37:44on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
People are cruel: complaints used to try to stop a retreat he spoke at
Mufti Abu Layth recounts how a self-styled journalist tried to get a 2016 retreat he spoke at cancelled by complaining to the venue and the police.
machine5 min 05 s1:44:04on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
'Danny Boy's' Telegram post calling female academics 'snarling witches'
Mufti Abu Layth mocks a commentator's post calling female Islamic Studies academics 'snarling witches', and says men who block women's education are insecure.
machine7 min 04 s1:49:09on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Ibn Ashur say Jesus was raised alive and will return?
Mufti Abu Layth says a preacher's post misquotes the tafsir it cites, which takes the verse to mean Jesus really died and leaves how he was raised open to interpretation.
machine12 min 53 s2:45:11on YouTube
19 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran say nothing against Jesus' second coming?
Mufti Abu Layth says the post mistranslates the tafsir: it says the Quran does not address the second coming, not that nothing in the Quran opposes it.
machine9 min 42 s2:58:04on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What do you think of a particular Salafi preacher?
From what he has heard, he says the preacher is generally level-headed and balanced within the Salafi dawah, though he has not followed him closely.
machine2 min 33 s30:07on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What do you think of Shaykh al-Sha'rawi?
His thoughts on al-Sha'rawi are positive, though he says he has not been influenced by him.
machine46 s50:44on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What do you think of Harun Yahya and his books?
Mufti Abu Layth says Harun Yahya's scientific-miracles books spread a lot of wrong information, and mocks the 1,000-year sentence given to Adnan Oktar.
machine8 min 06 s51:30on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Announcement: a Mind Trap discussion with Dr Abdullah Abdul Majid on BukhariGate
Announcement: a Mind Trap discussion on BukhariGate with Dr Abdullah Abdul Majid is set for next Thursday, and he asks viewers to be respectful.
machine4 min 03 s1:30:41on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why do clever preachers stay stuck in dogmatism?
Mufti Abu Layth says knowing a lot is not the same as reasoning well; much of the dogmatist scene relies on rote learning, and Zakir Naik has done Islam real damage.
machine6 min 55 s1:51:38on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Will you invite Javed Ahmad Ghamidi onto Mind Trap?
Mufti Abu Layth says, as his personal view, that Ghamidi himself is down to earth, but the team around him is protective and hard to reach; Dr Shehzad Saleem is the exception.
machine8 min 05 s2:11:08on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
What do you think of a particular online activist?
Mufti Abu Layth warns that anyone who says Muslims need to take over the world should set alarm bells ringing.
machine3 min 12 s2:19:51on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Mind Trap guest suggestions and the 'blacklisting' mentality
Guest suggestions for Mind Trap; he says his only criteria are that guests be interesting and interested, and he criticises the blacklisting culture.
machine7 min 09 s2:22:25on YouTube
8 Jan 2021video
Rumours that Mufti Abu Layth is behind a social media preacher
Mufti Abu Layth dismisses as a crazy conspiracy theory the claim that he, Yasir Qadhi or Mohammed Hijab is behind a social media preacher he likes.
machine3 min0:02on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Dr Abdul Majid's response to BukhariGate, and an invitation to Mind Trap
Mufti Abu Layth has invited Dr Abdul Majid onto Mind Trap to discuss BukhariGate, and says he found no actual refutation in the response he watched.
machine3 min 47 s10:15on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How can we stop Salafi ideas from dominating how people see Islam?
Denounce every preacher of hatred, Shia or Salafi, and spread a reasoned narrative; he feels the Salafi dawah is already losing ground.
machine6 min 25 s54:50on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Dawah Man on pigs, wife-sharing and handshakes, played and mocked
Mufti Abu Layth plays and mocks Dawah Man's claims about pigs and handshakes, and says shaking hands is not haram.
machine6 min 17 s1:00:54on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Will Hamza Tzortzis or Nouman Ali Khan come on Mind Trap?
Mufti Abu Layth would love to host them on Mind Trap and will resume after his Covid recovery; Shady Nasser has agreed to come on.
machine2 min 51 s1:33:28on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Will Lupe Fiasco come on Mind Trap?
Yes: Lupe Fiasco has agreed in principle, and Mufti Abu Layth says he will follow it up.
machine58 s1:50:48on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Can a Christian really speak with God?
Anyone can have a direct line to God whatever they call Him; he says the atheist one-god-further argument is a fallacy.
machine5 min 22 s1:52:12on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did early Muslims really not count Ali as the fourth rightly guided caliph?
Ali is a hero of Islam and preferring him is a personal matter, but he rejects the story of Umar burning Fatima's door and urges moving on.
machine8 min 09 s2:05:48on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Was Christianity still a true religion until Muhammad's first revelation?
Mufti Abu Layth reframes the question: Jesus was sent to the Israelites, not the Arabs, and monotheists existed in Arabia before the Prophet.
machine1 min 20 s2:13:43on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Do Shia scholars treat ordinary people better than Salafi scholars do?
The problem lies in the extremes of both; from the few clips he has seen he cannot promote Ammar Nakshawani, though he may be wrong.
machine2 min 26 s2:14:41on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhy is Yasir Qadhi saying the Prophet was infatuated with Zaynab?
Mufti Abu Layth finds Yasir Qadhi's recent claim, that the Prophet's infatuation with Zaynab was the early normative account, baffling and harmful, and plays clips to show it.
machine9 min 17 s2:30:24on YouTube
5 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the Prophet fall in love with Zaynab bint Jahsh?
No: he says the early hadith collections do not carry the love story, and it makes no sense given the Prophet had known Zaynab all his life.
machine7 min2:38:27on YouTube
4 Jan 2021video
Is masturbation haram in Islam?
In the clip Yasir Qadhi says the majority hold masturbation to be haram, but that others held it makruh or permissible, citing Ibn Abbas's reply to a young man and Ibn Hazm, and that he believes there is no sin in it although it is better avoided. This is Qadhi's view played for discussion, not Mufti Abu Layth's own statement.
machine3 min 58 s1:22on YouTube
4 Jan 2021video
Reaction to the clip: Qadhi joins Zakir Naik in calling it not haram, with jokes about 'the nobility'
Mufti Abu Layth notes that Yasir Qadhi, like Zakir Naik before him, now says masturbation is not haram but merely not a noble deed, and jokes about left-handers and 'the nobility'.
machine2 min 38 s4:00on YouTube
4 Jan 2021video
Why are Salafi scholars now saying masturbation is not a sin after years of calling it haram?
Mufti Abu Layth says these scholars owe an apology to the Muslims they guilt-tripped for decades, since Ibn Hazm's and the Hanbali view were known to them all along and nothing new has come to light. He attributes the reversal to imams saying what the public expects until they feel they can say otherwise.
machine6 min 02 s6:38on YouTube
2020 · 185
11 Dec 2020video
Did Zakir Naik say masturbation is not haram?
Zakir Naik has said masturbation is not haram but only discouraged. Mufti Abu Layth says those who preached it as haram for decades owe people an admission and an apology, and ridicules the view that only one's own hand makes it haram.
machine5 min 36 s0:01on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why did a medical doctor choose to study religion at Harvard?
The guest describes training as a physician and then turning to Arabic and Islamic studies at Berkeley and Harvard, where he is now a PhD candidate in the study of religion, despite his family's initial unease.
machine3 min 33 s0:04on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is it better to study Islam at a madrasa or at a Western university?
The guest says he chose the critical academic study of Islam over al-Azhar, considering it superior, though he took two years of al-Azhar's online programme and recommends combining traditional and academic study.
machine3 min 07 s3:37on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Are madrasas failing their students?
Mufti Abu Layth says the madrasa phenomenon is dysfunctional and dumbs students down though it supplies the raw materials; both say those who leave orthodox positions are ostracised, and the guest recommends a few years of traditional study combined with academic study.
machine5 min 25 s10:05on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does God's morality change over time?
The guest says universal morality does not change, only ritual law: the Quran corrects the biblical conquest narrative by implying the Israelites inherited Egypt rather than slaughtering another people.
machine2 min 11 s47:41on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How should the stories in the Quran be read?
The guest describes his dissertation on jihad in the Quran and his project translating Muhammad Ahmad Khalafallah's suppressed study of the Quran's narrative art, which he says is right.
machine3 min 59 s59:44on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the Prophet Muhammad perform miracles?
The guest argues that the Quran implies the Prophet performed no miracles and ties signs to compulsion, so traditionalists read miracles in from hadith; both speakers appear to reject the view that every prophet needs a miracle.
machine4 min 27 s1:30:29on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the Dhul Qarnayn story based on the legend of Alexander?
The guest says scholarship shows the Dhul Qarnayn story derives from a Byzantine Christian legend of Alexander walling in Gog and Magog, known to the Quran's first audience; Mufti Abu Layth asks why the Quran then tells it so ambiguously.
machine4 min 34 s2:06:50on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why does the guest criticise Yasir Qadhi's views on jinn and evolution?
The guest criticises Yasir Qadhi's dogmatic style and his literal readings of Dhul Qarnayn, evolution and jinn, offering a medical explanation for exorcism accounts; Mufti Abu Layth jokes about the zombie theory and calls Brubaker courteous.
machine7 min 56 s2:33:08on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Closing: the guest's projects, his statement of faith, and a safe space for views
The guest describes his planned article and book, affirms that he believes the Quran is divine revelation and that his views are legitimate, and Mufti Abu Layth says no one has the authority to silence learned opinions by calling them misguided.
machine6 min 14 s2:47:50on YouTube
10 Dec 2020video
Yasir Qadhi's reply to Jay Smith over 'holes in the standard narrative'
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.
machine6 min 58 s0:00on YouTube
10 Dec 2020video
Is Jay Smith a reliable critic of the Quran's preservation?
No: he agrees with Yasir Qadhi that Jay Smith and David Wood are not clued up and chase sensation, repeating academics' summaries without understanding them.
machine6 min 59 s6:58on YouTube
10 Dec 2020video
Yasir Qadhi still has not explained his 'holes in the narrative'
Mufti Abu Layth says that the controversy over 'holes in the narrative' is one Yasir Qadhi landed himself in deeply, since he never offered a response or clarity at the time beyond suggesting people take his course. He expects critics like Jay Smith to chase him over it because they know he cannot answer it. He jokes at length about Yasir Qadhi wanting Muslims to popularise the word 'ultracrepidarian', saying it shows he has lived most of his life in a library. He says he respects him for saying he holds a different view and for raising awareness that there are some forty views, but is disappointed that in what was meant as his final word he again evaded explaining what he actually believes.
machine5 min 46 s13:57on YouTube
9 Dec 2020video
Is it haram for men to wear necklaces, rings or earrings?
Mufti Abu Layth disagrees with Yasir Qadhi that men's jewellery is effeminate, saying men have always worn it and Western executives are no benchmark for Islamic etiquette.
machine8 min 38 s1:15on YouTube
6 Dec 2020video
Why don't Sunni imams like Malik and Abu Hanifa transmit from Imam Jafar al-Sadiq?
Mufti Abu Layth's theory is that the early imams of the Ahl al-Bayt were for the most part as the Shia describe them, so Malik and Abu Hanifa, though respectful of them, did not transmit from them because it would have caused a political storm. He adds that this does not make the Shia theological claims more authentic.
machine6 min 35 s0:02on YouTube
6 Dec 2020video
Did Imam Malik and Abu Hanifa study under Imam Jafar al-Sadiq, and what did they learn from him?
Malik and Abu Hanifa kept Imam Jafar's company and attended his circles but transmitted nothing from him, which Mufti Abu Layth explains by their disagreement with teaching that largely reflected the Shia da'wah. He calls the claim that they took only 'spirituality' from him absurd.
machine2 min 09 s6:37on YouTube
21 Nov 2020video
Why do popular preachers promote belief in jinn possession?
Mufti Abu Layth will answer Omar Suleiman's clip as a prime example of preachers promoting superstition; he says they appease the market that buys their commodity.
machine2 min 39 s0:02on YouTube
21 Nov 2020video
The clip: Omar Suleiman on jinn possession, the riba verse and disobedience
In the clip Omar Suleiman says jinn possession is real and affirmed by the riba verse, that most imams have seen supernatural cases, and that disobedience, especially leaving prayer and riba, removes Allah's protection and invites possession.
machine3 min 53 s2:41on YouTube
21 Nov 2020video
Can there be a balanced view on whether jinn possess people?
A supernatural claim cannot be balanced; possession is either real or not. If disobedience, missing prayer and riba invited possession, most of the globe would be possessed.
machine5 min 15 s6:34on YouTube
21 Nov 2020video
Is Omar Suleiman trained as a scholar, and will anyone debate Mufti Abu Layth on jinn possession?
Mufti Abu Layth challenges any shaykh to debate jinn possession on his show and says Omar Suleiman, though commendable for his civil rights work, is not trained as a scholar or qualified to give rulings.
machine4 min 27 s49:49on YouTube
17 Nov 2020video
Would the Mufti debate a Salafi scholar on aqidah?
Yes: he challenges any learned Salafi to prove their aqidah obligatory from the Quran alone. He says he is sure none can do it clearly.
machine2 min 46 s0:00on YouTube
15 Nov 2020video
A clip of Shaykh Hassan Ali on the evil eye from loved ones
A played clip in which Shaykh Hassan Ali says the evil eye can come even from loving relatives, with a story about his own son.
machine2 min 41 s0:00on YouTube
12 Nov 2020video
Mufti Abu Layth challenges Shadee Elmasry to debate Maliki fiqh
Mufti Abu Layth says his critics do not know Maliki fiqh and challenges them to debate him on any Maliki topic.
machine1 min 32 s0:00on YouTube
5 Nov 2020video
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Shaykh Hamza Yusuf?
Mufti Abu Layth loves Hamza Yusuf as an icon for Western Muslims and a key inspiration for his own studies, while disagreeing with his neo-traditionalist views. He adds second-hand reports that his personal manner can seem unwelcoming, and says their personalities would probably not match.
machine5 min 54 s0:00on YouTube
28 Oct 2020video
Where did the idea of sacrificing a son come from in Ibrahim's time?
Human sacrifice to gods such as Moloch and Baal was a widespread practice of the ancient Near East, and the Bible's story of Jephthah sacrificing his daughter shows it. Mufti Abu Layth says this surrounding culture explains how such a dream could come to Ibrahim.
machine3 min 57 s3:58on YouTube
28 Oct 2020video
Why does the biblical tradition say God commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Israelites adopted the name Yahweh, a Near Eastern war god from the household of El, and that god's brutal character carried over into their picture of God, making such a command plausible to them. For Muslims, he says, that is not the true image of Allah.
machine3 min 57 s17:12on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why don't scholars like Yasir Qadhi come on Mind Trap with you?
Mufti Abu Layth says critics such as Yasir Qadhi will not join him on Mind Trap, and he feels the real reason is that they are intimidated by him.
machine7 min 45 s26:02on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Mufti Abu Layth's chat round: answering critics, soft drinks and Syrian rue
Mufti Abu Layth says he only answers persistent public critics, that non-alcoholic drinks are halal, and that he has not read the reports on Syrian rue.
machine3 min 27 s46:55on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Mufti Abu Layth's chat round: Sunni and Maliki, beards and quick answers
Quick answers: Mufti Abu Layth says he is Sunni and Maliki, and that the din is not in the beard.
machine2 min 06 s1:10:06on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Would you debate Mohammed Hijab or talk with Richard Dawkins?
Mufti Abu Layth doubts Mohammed Hijab would come on Mind Trap, and says he would love to talk with Richard Dawkins, whom he admires.
machine1 min 20 s2:07:42on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Would you debate a Salafi scholar?
Mufti Abu Layth challenges any Salafi scholar to debate him and prove a practice they call obligatory from the Quran or sunnah alone.
machine3 min 01 s2:18:30on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Mufti Abu Layth's chat round: Birmingham over London and channel housekeeping
Mufti Abu Layth picks Birmingham over London and handles housekeeping in the chat.
machine3 min 14 s2:46:42on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the second coming of Jesus the right answer to the Qadianis?
Mufti Abu Layth says that the real answer to the Qadiani claim is that no messiah is coming, not a defence of the second coming.
machine6 min 21 s2:53:59on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Imam Malik say that Jesus died?
Mufti Abu Layth says there is no Quranic verse on a second coming and that the Imam Malik report of Jesus's death is in a reliable Maliki source.
machine11 min 07 s3:03:26on YouTube
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Mufti Abu Layth mocks a critic's clip on intimacy and slit bedsheets
Mufti Abu Layth ridicules a critic's story that intimacy was once seen as so foul that couples used slit bedsheets.
machine4 min 39 s3:11:27on YouTube
20 Oct 2020video
Why do critics refuse to debate the authenticity of Sahih al-Bukhari?
Critics who say Mufti Abu Layth knows nothing about Sahih al-Bukhari decline his invitation to debate it, and Jonathan Brown admitted on Facebook that he lacked the research. Mufti says al-Farabri's reliability can only be asserted from sources centuries later, not from anyone who knew him.
machine3 min 59 s0:00on YouTube
20 Oct 2020video
Who vouched for al-Farabri, the transmitter of Sahih al-Bukhari?
Sahih al-Bukhari reaches us through al-Farabri alone, and nobody who knew him vouched for him, so Mufti Abu Layth says the whole edifice rests on one man. Critics who only know how to debate the Shia avoid this question.
machine2 min 38 s3:59on YouTube
20 Oct 2020video
Why do preachers attack views in public that they tolerate in private?
Most preachers are controlled by the crowd that follows them: the same figures who are friendly off camera attack Mufti Abu Layth on camera because their followers expect it. Al-Farabri likewise took an opportunity that brought fame, which does not oblige others to be blind.
machine3 min 56 s6:37on YouTube
20 Oct 2020video
Why do scholars avoid showing unity across Barelvi, Deobandi and Salafi lines?
Scholars from different sects who met privately refused even a group photo, saying their followers were not mature enough to see it. Mufti Abu Layth says this shows preachers feeding their followers' expectations out of fear of being disowned.
machine2 min 34 s10:33on YouTube
17 Oct 2020video
What were soma and haoma in the Hindu and Persian traditions?
Ancient traditions such as the Vedic soma and the Avestan haoma point to the same entheogenic experiences, which those cultures had no vocabulary to explain; soma is argued to be Amanita muscaria, which may explain the deification of cows and the drinking of their urine.
machine3 min 43 s18:24on YouTube
16 Oct 2020video
Should Muslims mourn Husayn every year on Ashura?
Mufti Abu Layth does not see annual mourning for Husayn as an Islamic practice and does not do it, but he does not condemn those who do.
machine1 min 56 s54:55on YouTube
16 Oct 2020video
Is it right to curse the companions or beat oneself in mourning for Husayn?
Mufti Abu Layth condemns using Husayn's mourning to curse the companions, a disservice to Husayn, and calls self-flagellation ignorance that many Shia authorities also reject.
machine2 min 10 s1:01:53on YouTube
13 Oct 2020video
Does questioning religion with reason destroy faith?
Not for him: he says he has put every matter of the deen to his reason and his faith stood the test, though he does not ask others to do the same.
machine1 min 58 s11:40on YouTube
13 Oct 2020video
Why doesn't the Quran clearly deny the virgin birth?
To build bridges with the Christians: the Quran used their terms and left room for their belief without affirming it, compromising only not on the Trinity.
machine2 min 31 s55:00on YouTube
12 Oct 2020video
Is the preacher Muhammad ibn Munir actually a qualified mufti?
Mufti Abu Layth says Mufti Munir turned out not to be a certified mufti, the title being a nickname, but seems a cool, funny and charismatic person he would like to host.
machine4 min 23 s0:00on YouTube
2 Sep 2020video
What did Daniel Haqiqatjou say about Yasir Qadhi calling verses mushkil?
In a clip, Daniel Haqiqatjou argues that Yasir Qadhi's explanation of 'problematic' verses as mushkil fails, since he says mushkil classically means ambiguous, not at odds with reason or science.
machine2 min 37 s0:00on YouTube
2 Sep 2020video
What is the background to the feud between Daniel Haqiqatjou and Jonathan Brown?
The feud goes back to Haqiqatjou's dismissal from Yaqeen Institute and his replacement by Jonathan Brown; Mufti Abu Layth says Haqiqatjou has since accused Yaqeen of selling out, and he calls his views extreme.
machine2 min 34 s2:37on YouTube
2 Sep 2020video
Does mushkil mean ambiguous or problematic?
Both sides have a point: mushkil was used technically for texts needing reconciliation and for the indeterminable, while Yasir Qadhi most likely meant it simply as 'problematic'.
machine4 min 06 s6:30on YouTube
2 Sep 2020video
What does Mufti Abu Layth make of the Brown and Haqiqatjou dispute over mushkil?
Mufti Abu Layth says Brown tends to nitpick Arabic instead of engaging the argument, rejects Haqiqatjou's claim that his credentials are irrelevant, and calls both sides strangely dogmatic.
machine4 min 39 s9:17on YouTube
28 Aug 2020video
Does Edip Yuksel believe in praying five times a day?
Mufti Abu Layth thinks Edip Yuksel accepts the five prayers but not as the primary objective. Mufti calls rejecting all hadith the opposite extreme to hadith dogmatism, since all we know of early Islam comes through the living tradition.
machine8 min 13 s0:01on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is it a virtue for a scholar never to hold an original position?
Mufti Abu Layth argues that a teacher of Islam who claims never to have held a position of his own is admitting he has never had an original thought in the faith.
machine3 min 46 s10:54on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Chat asides: an edited comedy appearance and a podcast invitation
Chat asides about an edited guest appearance and a suggested podcast guest.
machine1 min 09 s48:47on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is it a problem that Muslim scholars today have no secular education?
Mufti Abu Layth agrees secular education matters but says it is no cure for obsession, and holds that other people being gay does not make anyone gay.
machine7 min 23 s1:03:21on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
How should Muslims react when someone tears or burns the Quran?
Mufti Abu Layth says tearing the Quran harms nothing in Islam and Muslims should never be enraged by it, while he condemns it and urges everyone to respect religious symbols.
machine8 min 13 s1:27:21on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is it right to attack critics of Islam personally?
Mufti Abu Layth says Mohammed Hijab bears some responsibility for provoking the Quran-tearing, and urges Muslims to attack arguments, not people and their families.
machine5 min 36 s1:35:34on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Are Abdullah bin Bayyah and Hamza Yusuf to blame for the UAE-Israel deal?
Mufti Abu Layth says it is unfair to blame Abdullah bin Bayyah and Hamza Yusuf for the UAE-Israel deal, since the UAE's ruler does not care what scholars think.
machine4 min 30 s1:41:10on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the Prophet really order Jews and Christians expelled from Arabia?
Mufti Abu Layth finds the hadith ordering the expulsion of Jews and Christians from Arabia suspect, since the Prophet traded with a Jewish man days before he died, and sees it as a later fabrication.
machine10 min 45 s2:07:28on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
The critic he nicknames Gangu Teli and his Twitter meltdown
Mufti Abu Layth's account of a critic's Twitter attacks on him and of who the critic is.
machine4 min 27 s2:35:13on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
An offer to discuss Sahih al-Bukhari live, and a demand for a moderated debate
Mufti Abu Layth recounts inviting the critic to a live discussion on Sahih al-Bukhari, which the critic declined in favour of a moderated debate.
machine7 min 39 s2:39:40on YouTube
24 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
'How I destroyed his career': mocking the critic's response video
Mufti Abu Layth mocks a critic's video claiming to have destroyed his career.
machine7 min 38 s2:47:19on YouTube
19 Aug 2020Responding to Refutations
What did the leak of Yasir Qadhi's emails on the Quran's preservation lead to?
The leak of Yasir Qadhi's emails set off a fitna in which people doubted or left Islam, and Yasir Qadhi's own explanation made it worse. Being clever and well-read does not make someone an academic.
machine3 min 07 s8:46on YouTube
16 Jul 2020video
Should Pakistan allow a Hindu temple to be built in Islamabad?
Yes, he says: Pakistan is a nation-state of equal citizens, not a khilafah, and Muslims who demand tolerance abroad while opposing a temple at home have become bigots. The Quran itself says Allah's name is glorified in other faiths' places of worship.
machine4 min 08 s26:20on YouTube
14 Jul 2020live stream
What do you think of the scholars on Mohammed Hijab's podcast?
Mufti Abu Layth says those now promoted as representatives of mainstream Islam have only mediocre knowledge, while those with more knowledge, like himself, lack the image.
machine2 min 32 s43:29on YouTube
14 Jul 2020live stream
Where did the idea that Aisha was six or nine come from?
Mufti Abu Layth says the six-and-nine narration seems to originate with Aisha's nephew Urwa, countering rumours spread against her, and that every chain runs through him.
machine4 min 19 s54:44on YouTube
14 Jul 2020live stream
Should Pakistan allow a Hindu temple in Islamabad?
Mufti Abu Layth supports the Islamabad temple: Pakistan is a nation-state of equal citizens, and Muslims who demand tolerance abroad but deny it at home are bigots.
machine4 min 27 s1:40:22on YouTube
10 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Who did Shaykh Omar Baloch study with?
The guest describes studying with Dr Israr Ahmed from the age of about thirteen and then with Imran Hosein in New York.
machine5 min 48 s3:50on YouTube
10 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What is Imran Hosein's approach, and why did he disagree with Israr Ahmed?
Mufti Abu Layth praises Imran Hosein's stand on the age of Aisha but finds his outlook almost conspiratorial; the guest says Imran Hosein and Israr Ahmed fell out over eschatology.
machine4 min 54 s9:38on YouTube
10 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Will people's better judgement win out over hatred?
Mufti Abu Layth is optimistic: he sees better judgement prevailing over time, especially among the young.
machine2 min 34 s36:13on YouTube
10 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the world getting better or worse?
Mufti Abu Layth sees humanity heading in a more positive than negative direction; the guest says the loan-based Western economy will bust.
machine3 min 14 s1:05:36on YouTube
10 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Should Pakistan allow a Hindu temple to be built in Islamabad?
Mufti Abu Layth thinks building a temple for Pakistani Hindus is a kind gesture and that Muslims have no reason to feel insecure about it.
machine3 min 12 s2:22:50on YouTube
10 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Was it right for Turkey to turn the Hagia Sophia back into a mosque?
Mufti Abu Layth would not issue a fatwa against praying in the Hagia Sophia, but says Muslims should stop being insecure and be comfortable in their skin.
machine1 min 56 s2:25:24on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Who is Dr Khalil Andani and how did he come to study Islam academically?
The guest describes leaving a career in accountancy to study Islamic studies at Harvard, where he finished a PhD and now teaches religion at a US college.
machine3 min 47 s3:01on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Muslims always see the Quran as God's word in the form of a book?
The guest argues that the idea of the Quran as God's literal words in book form was not held by all Muslims historically, and that the Quran presents itself as a series of oral revelations manifesting a heavenly writing.
machine6 min 11 s7:40on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did revelation end with the Prophet, or does inspiration continue?
The guest says that for Shi'is, Sufis and arguably jurists some form of revelatory inspiration continues; Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran will always continue to mean different things to different people over time.
machine2 min 38 s19:58on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Where do anthropomorphic ideas of God in Islam come from?
Mufti Abu Layth suggests anthropomorphic texts were partly inherited from the Judeo-Christian tradition; the guest describes the Sufi, philosophical and Isma'ili view that God's names describe relations, not his essence.
machine4 min 41 s1:24:04on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is love one of God's attributes in Islam?
The guest says Sufi traditions understand God's mercy as love even though Kalam rarely speaks of it, and rejects the polemic that the God of Islam is not loving.
machine1 min 52 s1:33:37on YouTube
29 Jun 2020video
Is alcohol under forty percent permissible, as a Pakistani mufti reportedly said?
Mufti Abu Layth says he cannot tell what the mufti meant: forty percent strength would be ridiculous, a diluted drink might rest on the Hanafi view on nabidh, and the cigarette analogy made no sense to him. He wants to hear the mufti's explanation before judging.
machine4 min 40 s1:13on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Opening: introducing Edip Yuksel, who refuses titles and insists all are equal
The guest rejects titles such as professor, saying that in religion, philosophy and politics only the words count, not the name or rank of the person speaking.
machine3 min 53 s0:35on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
The guest's background: languages, translations, books, Beltways and a constitution for Turkey
The guest describes his languages, his Turkish and English translations of the Quran, his books on the number 19, his unpaid religious work, his Beltways transit project, a proposed Netflix documentary and a draft constitution for Turkey.
machine8 min 29 s4:28on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why did Edip Yuksel write a reformist translation of the Quran?
The guest describes translating the Quran with Rashad Khalifa and says the Sunni religion distorted the message, beginning with adding Muhammad's name to the shahada; he calls Sunni and Shia translations deliberate distortions and says the Quran was betrayed through hadith.
machine8 min 32 s12:57on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the number 19 appear in the guest's life before he discovered it in the Quran?
Before he knew anything about the number 19 the guest had named his youth activist group FT-19, which he sees as an early connection to the number.
machine2 min 39 s2:02:04on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is seeing the number 19 everywhere a sign or a superstition?
The guest rejects personal and anecdotal sightings of 19 as numerology and chance, distinguishing them from the Quran's structure, and invites Zakir Naik and Nouman Ali Khan to debate him.
machine2 min 40 s2:17:50on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What is Mufti Abu Layth's own position on hadith compared with the Quran-only view?
Mufti Abu Layth is a Sunni who is critical of parts of the hadith literature without rejecting it wholesale, and he opposes labelling Quran-only Muslims as deviants or misguided.
machine1 min 19 s2:20:30on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Closing: how to reach the guest, conferences, peace with Sunnis and Shias, and parliamentary speeches
The guest invites contact through his website and proposes Zoom sessions and conferences with Sunni and Shia scholars, saying he debates fiercely but bears no animosity and defends anyone's rights; he points viewers to his parliamentary speeches and his refutation of ISIS.
machine3 min 56 s2:45:14on YouTube
20 Jun 2020video
Why did Mufti Abu Layth change from how he looked and spoke in his old videos?
The change in his look and views came gradually over more than a decade through study, reading and new circles, not from any event or loss of faith. His personality, he says, was always the same; the old clip only shows the serious speaking style he was taught.
machine17 min 59 s2:32on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How did Dr Shehzad Saleem come to research the history of the Quran?
Teaching the history of the Quran at Al-Mawrid in 1999, the guest was shocked by questions in the Muslim sources themselves: multiple extant readings, reports of a lost rajm verse, compilation by two witnesses, differing companion codices and the Shia account. His book is the result of the quest that followed.
machine7 min 36 s4:02on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the Quran preserved exactly as it was revealed?
The guest says the Quran is preserved absolutely, dot for dot and in the revealed order, and that the other readings need a separate explanation; preservation in its original language is what distinguishes it from the Bible. His view develops Farahi's thesis as transmitted through Islahi and Ghamidi.
machine6 min 33 s13:10on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How was the Quran preserved: by memory or in writing?
The Quran was preserved primarily by thousands of companions memorising it and passing it on generation to generation, which is what tawatur means; writing was secondary and always needed a hafiz's testimony.
machine3 min 55 s17:05on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the Prophet leave a written Quran, and what did the caliphs really do?
At the Prophet's death the Quran lived in the community's recitation, teaching and notes; he deliberately left no official codex. The caliphs merely spread copies, and the guest says the Bukhari narratives about their compilation are weak in chain and content.
machine3 min 57 s21:00on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Where do the variant readings of the Quran come from?
The guest says the Quran was revealed chronologically and then recompiled in a new divine order, as 75:16-19 describes; remnants of the earlier recitation kept by the companions are the biggest source of the qira'at. The final order was fixed when the Prophet revised the Quran twice with Jibril in his last Ramadan.
machine3 min 57 s24:57on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How did the earlier recitation and other readings get mixed up with the Quran?
The guest names four sources of the variant readings: remnants of the earlier revelatory sequence kept by the companions and later blurred with the Quran under al-Shafi'i's scholarly transmission, the mixing of similar passages, companions' explanatory synonyms taken as readings, and fabrication in the second and third centuries.
machine7 min 53 s28:54on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why did Muslim scholars record disagreements about the Quran's text rather than hide them?
The guest says the scholars transmitted the variant reports out of sheer honesty, just as they preserved and marked scribal errors in the mushaf, and that variation was inevitable once the revealed sequence was rearranged. Mufti Abu Layth notes in passing that he agrees with Ghamidi that there is no second coming of Jesus.
machine5 min 16 s44:35on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What was the qira'a al-'amma, and why does Morocco recite a different reading?
The common reading of Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, Ali and the companions, al-qira'a al-'amma, is the mushaf we have, while the other readings stayed in scholars' books; Morocco reads Nafi' only because a third-century ruler imposed it on account of Imam Malik's preference. Mufti Abu Layth adds that the early generations were more secure in their faith than later, institutionalised Islam.
machine5 min 14 s48:32on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How did the seven canonical readings of the Quran come about?
In the second and third centuries leading reciters were given the privilege of ikhtiyar, choosing one of the inherited variants for each verse by their own criteria, and Ibn Mujahid later popularised seven of them. Mufti Abu Layth says he agrees these readings are not mutawatir and not on the level of the common reading.
machine5 min 16 s53:49on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why did the reading of Hafs from Asim become the standard Quran?
The guest relays Ghamidi's thesis that Hafs alone transmitted the common reading without adding his own choices, so his reading coincides with the original. The seven-ahruf hadith was taken as licence for the reciters' choices, and Ibn Mujahid's seven prevailed through his standing and state position.
machine5 min 13 s57:45on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
If Quraysh did not pronounce the hamza, why does the Hafs reading of the Quran?
The guest says dialect only changes pronunciation, not the word, and such variation was permitted, while the claim that Quraysh had no hamza is itself unproven. Mufti Abu Layth says he had concluded that the Quran came in a standardised formal Arabic that used the hamza.
machine6 min 31 s1:04:16on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Do the early manuscripts with different words undermine the preservation of the Quran?
The guest says such manuscripts were bound to exist once people wrote down the readings, and that a reading needs correct Arabic and a chain to the Prophet, with ijtihad only in preference. Mufti Abu Layth adds that the harshest critics of the readings were Muslim grammarians of Basra such as al-Mazini, until later grammarians like Ibn Malik embraced them.
machine6 min 30 s1:10:45on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Isn't it too convenient that the one preserved reading is exactly the Hafs Quran we have?
Mufti Abu Layth states his own view that the Quran was always dynamic and allowed some flexibility of wording, as Imam Malik and al-Shafi'i held companions could substitute words. The guest answers the convenience objection by saying the reasoning, not the result, should be judged, and that later scholars missed the verses of al-Qiyamah because of a flawed report from Ibn Abbas and a hadith-centric mindset.
machine5 min 12 s1:18:35on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the guest's approach to the Quran's history just confirmation bias?
The guest says his questions came from the Muslim sources themselves, not from Western scholars, who have merely extracted the same data from Muslim books. Muslims must answer such questions rather than snub them, since the Quran is a book for all mankind.
machine2 min 37 s1:24:40on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
If Allah promised to preserve the Quran, why are there variant readings at all?
The guest says Allah preserved his part, the real Quran, and left people the discretion that produced the other readings, just as he allowed hadith to be misreported; the test is in seeking the truth through them. Mufti Abu Layth states his own view that the Quran we have is from an umbrella revelation that allowed variations.
machine3 min 54 s1:27:17on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Was there ever a verse of stoning in the Quran, and does stoning still apply?
The guest says Umar's 'verse of rajm' refers to the muharaba verse 5:33, from which exemplary punishment including stoning derives, and that it still applies to extreme crimes under strict conditions. Mufti Abu Layth holds that the Prophet only condoned stoning from Jewish practice until the lashing verse, and that under Maliki scholars like al-Burzuli the hudud change with the age.
machine5 min 14 s1:31:11on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does a reciter's chain of teachers back to the Prophet prove the Quran's text?
A single chain of huffaz only testifies who taught whom and does not authenticate the text on its own; preservation rests on the vast number of people transmitting the same thing, of which one chain is a drop in the ocean.
machine1 min 06 s1:36:25on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Was Ibn Mas'ud's Quran different from the Quran we have?
No: the guest says the reports that Ibn Mas'ud rejected al-Fatiha or the last two surahs are wrongly ascribed to him, and the major companions vouched for the same Quran, the only traceable dispute being over the word 'qul'. Mufti Abu Layth also says he would not advocate cutting the hand today, since for him the hudud have already changed with the age.
machine3 min 57 s1:37:31on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the variant readings of the Quran come from missing dots and vowel marks?
Partly: the guest says the lack of diacritics let words like ya'lamun and ta'lamun be read either way where both were ascribed to the Prophet, one of several causes he lists. Mufti Abu Layth clarifies that nobody is claiming a verse of rajm exists in the Quran.
machine1 min 19 s1:41:28on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
In what sense is the Quran a miracle?
The guest says the Quran's miracle is linguistic, a composition that cannot be emulated, not mathematical. Mufti Abu Layth adds that for him it is a miracle in the subjective experience of reading it, in its civilisational impact and in its literary symmetry, not in bending the laws of nature or in scientific foreknowledge.
machine3 min 56 s1:42:47on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Which reading of the Quran reached India, Malaysia and Indonesia, and why?
The common reading, later called the reading of Hafs, reached the subcontinent and the Far East through the masses, while the other readings took root only where scholars arrived first. Mufti Abu Layth sums up: the Quran is preserved as the qira'a al-'amma of the Prophet's final recitation, and Hafs coincides with it because he made no choices of his own.
machine4 min 53 s1:46:43on YouTube
17 Jun 2020video
What did Yasir Qadhi say to Mohammed Hijab about the preservation of the Quran?
In Mufti Abu Layth's account, Yasir Qadhi said there were 'huge problems' with the preservation of the Quran, discussed only the problem and not the answer, and pointed people to his paid course. Mufti himself says the standard narrative has holes and leaves pressing questions unanswered.
machine2 min 36 s0:00on YouTube
17 Jun 2020video
How did Mohammed Hijab react after his interview with Yasir Qadhi backfired?
According to Mufti Abu Layth, Hijab posted that Yasir Qadhi 'will be refuted' once the mob turned, which Mufti attributes to a wish for popularity. Mufti says he would never backstab a guest in that way.
machine3 min 51 s2:36on YouTube
17 Jun 2020video
Why does he say the backlash against Yasir Qadhi is his own doing?
Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi and Hijab built the refutation culture that has now turned on them, and that a shaykh who calls Halloween, Christmas greetings, music and the beard too controversial should not open with the preservation of the Quran.
machine3 min 57 s6:27on YouTube
17 Jun 2020video
What should Yasir Qadhi have said about the preservation of the Quran?
Mufti Abu Layth says the mistake was raising the problem in public without any answer: Qadhi should have given some answer, such as saying plainly that the Quran would come out the same as it is today. The fallout, he says, is Qadhi's own fault.
machine6 min 24 s10:24on YouTube
17 Jun 2020video
What does he think will happen to Yasir Qadhi and Mohammed Hijab after this controversy?
Mufti Abu Layth predicts Qadhi must choose between owning his view and losing followers, and that Hijab will face a similar crisis within a decade because their claimed certainties are unsustainable. He says he is glad he never pandered to a crowd that would turn on him.
machine2 min 21 s16:48on YouTube
9 Jun 2020video
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Hasan Farhan al-Maliki?
Mufti Abu Layth admires Hasan Farhan al-Maliki's open-minded rejection of folkloric Islam but disagrees with his dismissive, Shia-inclined stance on companions such as Mu'awiya.
machine2 min 24 s0:00on YouTube
29 May 2020video
Was the arrest of Engineer Muhammad Ali Mirza justified?
No: Mufti Abu Layth calls the arrest unacceptable and the product of jealousy and sectarianism, praising Engineer Mirza as an open-minded scholar.
machine3 min 07 s0:00on YouTube
28 Apr 2020video
The backlash to Maulana Tariq Jamil's dua on media, modesty and the pandemic, and the clip
Mufti Abu Layth sets out the controversy over Maulana Tariq Jamil's dua, in which he criticised media lies and spoke of modesty, reads critics who called it misogynistic, and plays the clip.
machine5 min 59 s0:00on YouTube
28 Apr 2020video
Did Maulana Tariq Jamil blame women for the coronavirus?
Mufti Abu Layth did not feel Tariq Jamil was blaming women for the pandemic; he heard a call to self-examination in a calamity. Despite disagreements, he supports him as a caring voice for unity and reflection.
machine3 min 53 s5:59on YouTube
28 Apr 2020video
Is it wrong to preach modesty to society?
There is nothing wrong with a message about modesty: like avoiding profanity in front of children, social propriety has a place even when one disagrees on details. Tariq Jamil's apology, he says, was big of him.
machine2 min 20 s9:52on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Have Muslims moved towards giving the Quran primacy over hadith?
The guest says the ummah has split: a traditional strand that in practice lets hadith override the Quran, and a growing body of thinking lay Muslims who already see the Quran as primary. Some scholars agree but are trapped in traditional discourse or silenced by dangerous circumstances.
machine3 min 56 s3:44on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran prescribe stoning for adultery?
The Quran's penalty for adultery is flogging, not stoning, which the guest says entered Muslim law from hadith and is biblical in origin, so explaining Islam to the public must start from the Quran. Mufti Abu Layth says he agrees completely that the Quran must have primacy.
machine5 min 14 s7:38on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran prescribe a punishment for apostasy?
The Quran prescribes no worldly penalty for apostasy, only punishment in the hereafter, and 'there is no compulsion in religion' is stated as emphatically as the testimony of faith. Rightly representing the Quran is about pleasing Allah, not the kuffar.
machine2 min 37 s11:34on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why did earlier scholars not see what reform-minded scholars see today?
Past scholars were great but fallible and bound by their time, like people in a smoke-filled room or marchers in a procession, while today we can see the whole history of ideas from the balcony. Mufti Abu Layth adds that the apostasy rule rests on one problematic narration from Ikrima in Bukhari.
machine3 min 57 s15:30on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can hudud punishments such as stoning or hand-cutting change with the times?
Mufti Abu Layth holds that stoning was a pre-Quranic practice abrogated by the Quran and that the Sharia's punishments reflect their age, as Maliki scholars and the Ottomans applied. The guest agrees that the spirit of the law can require departing from its letter, as Umar did when he suspended hand-cutting in a famine.
machine6 min 33 s18:08on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is using reason to interpret Islam just preferring my own intellect over revelation?
The intellect alone is not a reliable guide, but an intellect guided by the Quran is tamed and becomes the right tool for understanding revelation. The word aql itself means the tether that keeps a camel from straying, and the Quran praises its use.
machine2 min 37 s25:59on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why do Muslims treat reason as the enemy of tradition?
Historically the Ahl al-Hadith defeated the Ahl al-Ra'y, which preserved the tradition but left reason demonised; today reason and tradition must work together. Mufti Abu Layth says asking whether one prefers reason to revelation is a false framing, since the real choice is between one understanding of the Quran and another.
machine5 min 16 s28:36on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How old was Aisha when she married the Prophet?
Writers such as Ruqaiyyah Waris Maqsood and Jamal Badawi conclude that Aisha was in her teens, and the report that her sister Asma died at a hundred in the year 73 puts her at about eighteen when she moved in with the Prophet. The guest explains the hadith's six and nine as numbers exaggerated downwards, as Khadija's forty was exaggerated upwards.
machine8 min 55 s33:52on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why do the circumstances of the Prophet's marriage rule out a six-year-old Aisha?
The marriage after the year of sorrow was meant to give the Prophet a companion, a carer for his children and a support in the da'wah, which a six-year-old could not provide, and Aisha had been engaged for years to a man whose mother feared she would convert him. Mufti Abu Layth suggests her age was exaggerated downwards after the ifk slander to defend her purity.
machine6 min 34 s41:29on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is questioning Aisha's age just an attempt to please non-Muslims?
The guest says he once made the same accusation, but came to see that a girl of nine is not fit for marriage and that Muslims themselves do not marry girls at that age. A report being in Bukhari does not make it the final word, since scholars have always differed with Bukhari where something more authentic exists.
machine6 min 30 s49:19on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can a hadith in Sahih al-Bukhari be questioned?
Sahih means Bukhari and Muslim verified the chains, which says little about the content, since reliable narrators still err and insert explanations; only the few mutawatir reports, mostly practices like the number of units in prayer, are beyond doubt. Mufti Abu Layth says he believes all the hadith on Aisha's age are weak.
machine6 min 33 s55:51on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How should hadith be evaluated, and did the companions ever misreport the Prophet?
Hadith should be judged one by one against the principles of the religion, observation and reason, as the earliest Muslims did before reason was sidelined. Aisha herself rejected several companions' reports, such as the dog, woman and donkey breaking the prayer, the dead punished by weeping, and the bad omen in a woman, showing how reports were misrelayed.
machine6 min 31 s1:05:05on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is criticising Sahih al-Bukhari an attack on Imam al-Bukhari?
Imam al-Bukhari deserves credit for sifting hadith and his shorter narratives are usually the more authentic, but he was a human being and his book is not the Quran. Mufti Abu Layth says BukhariGate critiques the myth of an untouchable gold standard, not the man.
machine3 min 56 s1:11:36on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does Islam teach that jinn can possess people?
Mufti Abu Layth does not believe in jinn possession, saying the Quran and Sunnah do not support it. The guest recounts a young man at his da'wah centre whose 'possession' appeared only around believers in it and vanished in front of doctors, which he reads as a psychological phenomenon rather than a jinn.
machine5 min 13 s1:15:32on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran support the idea that Shaytan or jinn can control a person?
The verse cited for possession is about rising on the Day of Judgment, and the Quran as a whole gives Shaytan only the power to whisper and no authority over Allah's servants. Possession would also destroy personal responsibility and let any criminal evade punishment, and Mufti Abu Layth says the claim that jinn can take any form makes the whole idea absurd.
machine4 min 55 s1:20:45on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Was Jesus born of a virgin, and how could a jinn father a child?
Mufti Abu Layth says he has recently become inclined to the view of Abdul Karim Athari and Tamanna Imadi that Jesus was born naturally, since the Quran never explicitly states a virgin birth and 6:101 argues from the absence of a companion. The guest sets that controversy aside and says a jinn, being a different species, could not impregnate a woman.
machine3 min 56 s1:25:40on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
If possession were real, why is there no sahih hadith of the Prophet casting out a jinn?
The Gospels make exorcism a chief miracle of Jesus, but the Quran never mentions it and there is no sahih hadith of the Prophet casting out a jinn, so the guest calls the belief overstated. Following Bilal Philips's study, he says the symptoms match psychological illness and medical treatment should come first.
machine3 min 55 s1:29:36on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is belief in magic spells and jinn possession part of Islam?
Belief in possession and magic spells holds Muslims back and harms mental health, and the guest says it is not a religious teaching because no verse or authentic hadith establishes it, whatever people believe they have seen. Mufti Abu Layth notes that to believers in jinn the ordinary explanation seems the far-fetched one.
machine6 min 33 s1:34:50on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does Surat al-Falaq confirm that black magic is real?
The verse about those who blow on knots does not establish that magic is effective: the guest says it asks protection from the fear such practices create, and Mufti Abu Layth says the surah names things not harmful in themselves but the superstitions attached to them. The question whether Islam is feudal went unanswered.
machine2 min 38 s1:40:04on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What does the Quran mean by 'what your right hands possess', and did the Prophet have a concubine?
The guest reads the Quran's 'right-hand possessions' as a category of wife who was not free, since 4:25 speaks of marrying slave girls, and thinks Mariya al-Qibtiyya may have been a wife misunderstood as a concubine. Mufti Abu Layth says Mariya was a wife, as he has taught, and that under trajectory hermeneutics slavery would have become haram.
machine7 min 13 s1:42:42on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Opening: welcoming Shaykh Kashif Khan from Australia and an audio check
Mufti Abu Layth welcomes Shaykh Kashif Khan to the MindTrap episode and checks that the audience can hear them.
machine2 min 36 s0:40on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Where did Shaykh Kashif Khan study, and what is the difference between Salafi and Ahl al-Hadith?
The guest studied with Salafi scholars in Pakistan, mostly privately; he says Madinah graduates prefer the name Salafi and the Pakistani Ahl al-Hadith prefer Ahl al-Hadith.
machine5 min 12 s3:16on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How did Shaykh Kashif Khan become religious, and does he regret his zealous phase?
The guest describes turning religious through the internet, cutting off friends and failing his degrees to travel with scholars, and says he does not regret it, calling it a developing experience.
machine9 min 11 s8:28on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why did clerics in Pakistan insist on reopening mosques during the coronavirus lockdown?
The guest says the clerics privately regard the coronavirus as a conspiracy and turned mosque closures into a religious issue that the authorities were reluctant to confront.
machine2 min 33 s17:39on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Do religious scholars lose their independence when they depend on donations?
The guest refuses to earn from religion because dependence on a group or donors forces scholars to say what their audience wants; Mufti Abu Layth says denominational dependency cripples independent thinking.
machine5 min 05 s20:12on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is it haram for medical students to dissect dead bodies?
The guest says dissecting cadavers for medical training is permissible, and cites a Salafi fatwa forbidding it as an example of Ahl al-Hadith rigidity.
machine3 min 57 s25:17on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can women be stopped from going to the mosque because of fitnah?
The guest says there is no evidence for keeping women from the mosque beyond fear of fitnah, since even harassment in the Prophet's time did not lead to a ban; Mufti Abu Layth cites Malik's report of men and women making wudu together.
machine6 min 31 s29:14on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is a woman on her period ritually impure?
Mufti Abu Layth says menstruation is a hygiene matter, not impurity; the guest cites late Hanbali scholars who permitted intercourse during menses and Abu Hanifa's longer breastfeeding period to show how varied the fiqh is.
machine6 min 36 s35:45on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How clearly was zakah defined in the Prophet's lifetime?
The guest says some salaf and Ibn Taymiyya counted taxes paid to the authorities as zakah; Mufti Abu Layth says zakah was not clearly defined in the Prophet's time and its later rules were a pragmatic tax decision.
machine5 min 08 s42:21on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is it haram for a husband to drink his wife's breast milk?
The guest says classical jurists allowed a husband to drink his wife's milk, and Mufti Abu Layth says the Maliki school considers it pure and not haram, unlike a stricter Hanafi view.
machine9 min 08 s55:16on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Do some muftis use lenient rulings for themselves but give strict ones to others?
The guest says some muftis take concessions such as the Ahl al-Hadith view on triple talaq for themselves while giving people harsh rulings, citing an account about a mufti in his neighbourhood.
machine2 min 37 s1:04:24on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can a past relationship or an accidental touch make my spouse haram for me?
Mufti Abu Layth says Hanafi fatwas of hurmat al-musahara that dissolve marriages over a premarital relationship with an in-law or an accidental touch destroy families, and that the Maliki school does not hold the ruling.
machine6 min 30 s1:07:01on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does a triple talaq count as one divorce or three?
The guest says triple talaq drives many to the Ahl al-Hadith view that it counts as one, while some Ahl al-Hadith scholars privately hold it counts as three but will not publish this for fear of controversy.
machine5 min 46 s1:13:31on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why do people react so strongly when a scholar challenges established views?
The guest says people feel threatened when their views are challenged, and that independence from groups and donors is what lets a scholar research and speak honestly.
machine3 min 53 s1:19:17on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is looking at an image of a naked person the same as looking at a real one in Islamic law?
The guest says he cannot call something haram without a text prohibiting it, so he presents the scholars' differing views on looking at a reflection or image and leaves the choice to the asker.
machine4 min1:28:23on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does lowering the gaze apply to images and screens?
The guest says most classical scholars took the forbidden gaze to be the lustful one, and that jurists distinguished seeing a person in the flesh from a reflection or screen, a matter on which there are two opinions.
machine7 min 56 s1:32:23on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Do non-Muslim women in a Muslim country have to cover up?
The guest says early scholars held that non-Muslim women cannot be forced to cover and that the prohibition on looking was applied only to believing women.
machine3 min 57 s1:40:19on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
If pornography is not called haram, does that mean it is encouraged?
The guest distinguishes saying something should not be done from declaring it haram; Mufti Abu Layth restates that they are not encouraging pornography, which may be harmful, but not calling it haram.
machine3 min 34 s1:44:16on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is masturbation haram in Islam?
The guest says no Companion is reported to have forbidden masturbation and that the only evidence cited against it is the advice to fast; Mufti Abu Layth says modern society demonises men's sexuality.
machine3 min 48 s1:47:50on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did classical scholars permit masturbation, and for women too?
The guest cites al-Shawkani's treatise and some Hanafi, Maliki and Hanbali reports permitting masturbation, and says some held the prohibition applies only to men; Mufti Abu Layth notes Malik's disdain as a social attitude.
machine5 min 16 s1:51:38on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is pornography today like the concubines of the past?
The guest rejects likening pornography to concubinage or mut'ah, calling it instant gratification, and describes Salafi efforts to suppress permissive classical texts; Mufti Abu Layth says these are real questions that need open discussion.
machine5 min 11 s1:56:54on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Doesn't the Islamic teaching on modesty make pornography haram?
The guest says the general teaching on modesty is not enough to declare something haram without clear evidence; Mufti Abu Layth says he is not convinced by the report that eating ice does not break the fast.
machine6 min 14 s2:02:05on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does masturbation or other sexual activity break the fast?
The guest says only intercourse is agreed to break the fast, citing Aisha's report and al-Albani; Mufti Abu Layth says he agrees that masturbation per se does not break the fast.
machine5 min 08 s2:08:19on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why do people get so upset about Islamic rulings on sex?
The guest blames a culture of shame in the subcontinent, and says the classical scholars and al-Bukhari show there is no shyness in learning the religion and that legitimate differences cannot be denounced.
machine7 min 41 s2:13:27on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is oral sex between spouses haram because the private parts are impure?
The guest says the arguments against oral sex within marriage, from the right-hand prohibition and from impurity, do not hold, since one's own body is not impure; Mufti Abu Layth says he agrees.
machine2 min 32 s2:21:08on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why talk publicly about permissive opinions if it might encourage people?
The guest says knowledge cannot be hidden in the internet age and that people lose trust when scholars conceal it, so it is better to tell them the recorded opinions.
machine5 min 14 s2:23:40on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Isn't it better to feel guilty when sinning so that you repent?
The guest says most scholars hold watching pornography is haram and people should not watch it, while academically the evidence resembles Imam Ahmad's 'I dislike it but do not say it is haram'.
machine2 min 23 s2:33:37on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does Islam teach us to feel guilty?
Mufti Abu Layth says guilt-tripping is not an Islamic concept but one taken from the Judeo-Christian tradition, and the guest says forbidding evil applies only to what the texts clearly prohibit.
machine5 min 14 s2:36:00on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does watching porn fuel sex trafficking?
Mufti Abu Layth says saying pornography is not categorically haram is not condoning abuses in the industry and does not in itself aid the market; the guest says people should be told its harms and follow the majority who forbid it.
machine8 min 52 s2:46:28on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How should someone approach studying Islam with an open mind?
The guest urges viewers to study sincerely, without bias or partisanship, across all books; Mufti Abu Layth says the transparency of the early scholars is badly needed today.
machine7 min 48 s2:54:03on YouTube
19 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Sign-off: thanks, more sessions to come, and how to reach the guest
Mufti Abu Layth thanks the guest, says more sessions will follow and signs off.
machine2 min 01 s3:01:51on YouTube
7 Apr 2020video
Do the prophets' bodies decay in the grave?
Mufti Abu Layth did not teach that the prophets' bodies decay: he read out a question and described a devotional and a factual approach, noting most Muslims take the devotional one. He says critics who present it as disrespect to the Prophet are lying.
machine7 min1:19on YouTube
7 Apr 2020video
Does the Mufti teach disrespect for the Prophet?
No: he says he has repeatedly defended the Prophet, denying that he married a child and rejecting narrations he finds insulting. Those accusing him took none of these stances.
machine4 min 27 s8:19on YouTube
7 Apr 2020video
Message to critics: criticise truthfully, not with lies
Mufti Abu Layth believes in Allah and His Messenger but rejects folkloric, medieval readings of Islam. He asks critics to attack his real views, not lies.
machine3 min 13 s12:46on YouTube
6 Apr 2020video
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Shaykh Muhammad al-Yaqoubi?
Mufti Abu Layth regards Shaykh al-Yaqoubi as a level-headed scholar who has spoken against extremism and would point someone set on joining a Sufi order to a figure like him, while thinking his admirers overdo it. He himself once took issue with al-Yaqoubi's statements on Bukhari.
machine2 min 37 s0:00on YouTube
6 Apr 2020video
What was in the letter attacking Shaykh al-Yaqoubi, and who sent it?
A Bradford-based board wrote to Shaykh al-Yaqoubi demanding he declare Shia, Deobandi and Salafi figures kafir and condemn The Study Quran and Hamza Yusuf, which Mufti Abu Layth calls a sectarian bullying session. He recognised only two signatories and was surprised to see Pir Saqib Shaami's name.
machine5 min 14 s2:37on YouTube
6 Apr 2020video
The letter's attack on Shaykh Akram Nadwi, and a played debate clip: 'one, two, three, kufr'
The letter also demanded that Shaykh Akram Nadwi be called a deviant. Mufti Abu Layth plays a debate clip of one signatory repeatedly counting 'one, two, three' and pronouncing kufr, which he holds up as absurd bullying.
machine3 min 40 s7:51on YouTube
6 Apr 2020video
Why does Mufti Abu Layth say both the attackers and the admirers of Shaykh al-Yaqoubi need balance?
People cannot be bullied into beliefs, and al-Yaqoubi has rightly not responded to the letter. But his admirers also need balance: claims that he performs miracles or read the Shama'il in four hours go too far and provoke hatred of him.
machine3 min 56 s11:31on YouTube
6 Apr 2020video
Why is demanding that a scholar make takfir a form of bullying?
It is bullying because it pushes a sectarian agenda by threatening to declare al-Yaqoubi a deviant or a kafir for refusing to pronounce on others' beliefs. The deen belongs to Allah, and it is nobody's duty to expel people from it.
machine1 min 25 s15:27on YouTube
31 Mar 2020video
Does Abul Kalam Azad praising Mirza Ghulam Ahmad prove anything?
Abul Kalam Azad may well have spoken kindly of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, as people who knew and liked a decent man would. Mufti Abu Layth finds it illogical that the critics accept a prophet who achieved nothing yet call his view that tattoos are not haram absurd.
machine2 min 40 s1:21on YouTube
22 Mar 2020On Current Events
Abdul Raheem Limbada and the dream of the coronavirus as a man
Mufti Abu Layth mocks a preacher's account of a dream in which the coronavirus appeared as a man sent to punish, calling it nonsense that people are preaching and sharing.
machine10 min 12 s0:01on YouTube
3 Mar 2020From the Mind of a Mufti
What does the Mufti think of Shaykh Ramadan al-Buti?
Mufti Abu Layth regards al-Buti as a great scholar of his time whose books, especially Ma'a al-Nas, he benefited from. He says it is a shame al-Buti got caught up in Syrian politics.
machine1 min 24 s0:00on YouTube
28 Feb 2020From the Mind of a Mufti
A visit to the Al-Mahdi Institute symposium on Fadak
Mufti Abu Layth describes attending a Sunni-Shia symposium on Fadak at the Al-Mahdi Institute in Birmingham and calls for more collaboration.
machine4 min 33 s0:00on YouTube
28 Feb 2020From the Mind of a Mufti
What was Fadak and why did it matter?
Fadak was fertile land near Khaybar that came to the Prophet as fay', without war, and he used its produce for travellers, his household and public needs.
machine5 min 42 s4:33on YouTube
28 Feb 2020From the Mind of a Mufti
Why did Abu Bakr refuse to give Fadak to Fatima?
Abu Bakr cited the hadith that prophets leave no inheritance; Shia sources say Fadak had been gifted to Fatima, while Sunni sources say the Prophet did not give it to her.
machine6 min 24 s10:15on YouTube
28 Feb 2020From the Mind of a Mufti
LatestWho was right about Fadak, Fatima or Abu Bakr?
Both, in his view: Fatima was right that prophets can be inherited from, but Fadak was fay' belonging to the public, so Abu Bakr was right to keep it under the state.
machine3 min 13 s16:39on YouTube
28 Feb 2020From the Mind of a Mufti
Why didn't Ali take back Fadak when he became caliph?
Mufti Abu Layth finds it a huge open question that Ali never reclaimed Fadak as caliph, and says the Shia answers he heard did not make sense to him.
machine5 min 13 s19:52on YouTube
17 Jan 2020Responding to Refutations
Reaction to Daniel Haqiqatjou's post about Mufti Menk writing 'Almighty' instead of 'Allah'
Mufti Abu Layth mocks Daniel Haqiqatjou's complaint that Mufti Menk tweets 'Almighty' rather than 'Allah' as petty, says Haqiqatjou is not trained in the Sharia, and says he is driven by hostility to the left rather than scholarship.
machine5 min 05 s0:00on YouTube
17 Jan 2020Responding to Refutations
Is it a Sunnah for women to pray in a wardrobe or the innermost room?
The claim that women praying in a wardrobe is a Sunnah rests on a weak, indeed false, hadith that is not a saying of the Prophet. Mufti Abu Layth sees the following of such claims as dogma and herd mentality.
machine2 min 24 s5:05on YouTube
2019 · 65
17 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Was pre-Islamic Makkah really a significant city?
Mufti Abu Layth thinks the revisionists have a point: Makkah was not a significant city or even a popular town, and its later image was an innocent reconstruction by Muslims rather than propaganda. He notes that Crone and Cook placed Makkah further north without settling on Petra.
machine2 min 35 s0:01on YouTube
17 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
What is Dan Gibson's Petra theory and are his measurements trustworthy?
Gibson measured around 160 early mosque foundations and found the earliest pointing to Petra rather than Makkah. Mufti Abu Layth says the data are transparent and not falsified, though Gibson is somewhat mischievous, and that his explanation of the south-pointing North African mosques is ridiculous.
machine2 min 39 s2:36on YouTube
17 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Who was Qusayy ibn Kilab and where was he raised?
Mufti proposes that Petra shaped early Islam through the Prophet's great-grandfather Qusayy, who was raised as a foreigner in Wadi al-Qura, which Mufti Abu Layth identifies with Petra. Qusayy's name means 'little stranger', and his longing for belonging drew him back to Makkah.
machine5 min 16 s5:15on YouTube
17 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Why do early Islamic books call the Ka'bah 'the Shami Ka'bah'?
Mufti Abu Layth suggests Qusayy, raised in Petra, rebuilt the Ka'bah and settled Quraysh around it in a Shami style, which is why early books call it the Shami Ka'bah. It does not mean the Ka'bah was in Sham.
machine3 min 55 s10:31on YouTube
17 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Why did the earliest mosques face Petra instead of Makkah?
Most likely, he says, because Muslims inherited Nabataean devotion sites already aligned to Petra's constellation, so Gibson is right about the measurements but wrong that Petra was Makkah. Makkah was called Umm al-Qura, he suggests, after Petra's name, brought by Qusayy.
machine3 min 31 s18:21on YouTube
16 Dec 2019Responding to Refutations
Was Islam spread by the sword?
Mufti Abu Layth says it is simply not true that Islam was spread by the sword, though there was surely compulsion in some places, and that it was wrong.
machine3 min 10 s2:33on YouTube
16 Dec 2019Responding to Refutations
Why did people in the past convert to new religions so readily?
People in the past were far more open to new gods than we are, adopting them in hope of good luck, so judging their conversions by today's identity-bound religion misleads.
machine5 min 04 s3:11on YouTube
16 Dec 2019Responding to Refutations
If Islam was not forced on people, why did so many convert?
Forced conversion was never the norm: Islam's power, trade and prestige drew people, and nobody could have policed the faith of a rural population. Some were surely forced, but not most.
machine4 min 14 s8:15on YouTube
12 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Mohammed Hijab's aggressive debating style?
Mohammed Hijab is intelligent, articulate and shows maturity of thought, but deliberately shouting at and dominating opponents on the claim that Allah commands harshness towards those who challenge Islam is, if that is what he meant, nonsensical and unacceptable.
machine2 min 38 s0:02on YouTube
12 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Does the Quran forbid Muslims from being friends with non-Muslims who challenge Islam?
The verse about not loving those who oppose Allah was revealed when tribes were confederating to attack the Muslims and concerns loyalty to them, not friendship with non-Muslims. Permission to marry Christians and Jews shows love and friendship with non-Muslims are allowed.
machine3 min 53 s2:40on YouTube
12 Dec 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Why does Mufti Abu Layth say Salafis cannot debate atheists without borrowing Ash'ari arguments?
Salafis argue from a standpoint that cannot hold its own against atheists, so Salafi-background debaters end up using Ash'ari and Maturidi arguments. The Hanbalis were literalists, not the theologians of the tradition.
machine1 min 19 s6:33on YouTube
9 Nov 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Shaykh Imran Hosein?
Mufti Abu Layth has not watched much of Imran Hosein but finds him preoccupied with doomsday culture, which he opposes. Islam, he says, is about optimism and seizing the day, as the hadith about carrying on planting when the Hour comes shows, and doom and gloom can fuel death cults.
machine5 min 31 s0:00on YouTube
4 Nov 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Is mut'ah (temporary marriage) haram?
Mut'ah is not haram in his understanding: the reports prohibiting it are contradictory and it is very hard to prove haram. Nobody is obliged to do it, and much of the hostility to it is anti-Shia sentiment.
machine8 min 47 s0:03on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Is it a sin for a Muslim woman not to cover her hair?
Contemporary scholars who say covering the hair is not obligatory hold a valid position, and not wearing hijab is an equally valid opinion to wearing it, which Mufti Abu Layth calls good as part of a woman's identity. What the Quran explicitly establishes is modesty, and the choice is a personal journey, not something to impose.
machine2 min 39 s9:10on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
Why is Mufti Abu Layth responding to Yasir Qadhi?
Mufti Abu Layth says he feels Qadhi may be in an existential crisis and does not believe much of what he says, and that even hypocrisy should keep some integrity, like the frankly self-confessed fraud of an Urdu poem.
machine3 min 48 s2:34on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
What are Ya'juj and Ma'juj (Gog and Magog), and could they be zombies?
Qadhi rejected the traditional reading of Ya'juj and Ma'juj on geographical grounds and floated colonialism and zombies; Mufti Abu Layth says the colonial reading holds strongly for him and mocks the zombie idea.
machine5 min 38 s6:22on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
Can Yasir Qadhi's zombie theory of Gog and Magog be defended?
Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi's zombie theory, refuted even by Salafi critics, cannot be justified and should simply be disowned.
machine4 min 47 s12:00on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
What did Yasir Qadhi say about Mufti Abu Layth on the Mad Mamluks podcast?
Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi, trying to reassert his traditional credentials on a podcast, said people like Mufti should declare themselves Mu'tazila rather than Sunni.
machine5 min 42 s16:47on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
Do most Sunnis consider Wahhabis and Salafis to be Sunni?
Mufti Abu Layth says it is ironic for a Wahhabi to expel others from Sunni Islam, since most Sunnis do not count Wahhabis as Sunni, while he himself is among the few who do.
machine3 min 04 s22:29on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
Does the Quran say Jesus was born of a virgin?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran does not explicitly state a virgin birth, citing recent scholars who read Mary's glad tidings like those given to Ibrahim and Zakariyya.
machine5 min 03 s28:07on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
Is it inconsistent to reinterpret Gog and Magog by geography but not other beliefs by science?
Mufti Abu Layth says Qadhi calls him a heretic for revisiting interpretations on grounds of science and reason, yet revisits Gog and Magog on grounds of geography with his own teacher's precedent, which he calls hypocrisy.
machine7 min 29 s33:10on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
Did the Salafi movement play a part in producing modern extremism?
Mufti Abu Layth says Salafis now oppose terrorism but their movement helped produce it, from the 1970s Salafi group to the 1979 Kaaba seizure, and that Qadhi's teachers belonged to that past.
machine6 min 20 s40:39on YouTube
3 Nov 2019Responding to Refutations
Can old interpretations of the Quran be revisited, and what role does reason play?
Mufti Abu Layth says long-standing interpretations that are not the Quran's clear expression may be revisited and that reason has primacy, but one must not condemn others for doing what one does oneself.
machine1 min 47 s46:59on YouTube
18 Oct 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Mufti Menk?
Mixed: Menk fills a real demand for simple, uplifting stories and is likeable and funny, but Mufti Abu Layth says such preachers spread inauthentic stories and cement false beliefs, and he suspects Menk is less strict than he portrays himself.
machine9 min 15 s0:02on YouTube
19 Sep 2019On the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ
Is it okay to criticise the companions of the Prophet?
Mufti Abu Layth advises most people to view the companions with veneration, but says anyone who chooses critical, academic study must apply it to every companion, Ali included, rather than selectively.
machine13 min 28 s1:19on YouTube
19 Sep 2019Responding to Refutations
Should Muslims build bridges with ex-Muslims?
Yes: he hopes Muslims can talk with ex-Muslims and critics as fellow human beings, as the early converts were won by human connection. He contrasts this with a preacher who refused any friendship with them.
machine2 min 30 s0:00on YouTube
19 Sep 2019Responding to Refutations
Islamic institutes, preachers' depth of learning, and passionate converts
Mufti Abu Layth says the preacher was, he believes, referring to the Yaqeen Institute, and that if this is what they promote they need to revisit themselves. He says he respects and applauds Omar Suleiman's social justice work and protests for discriminated communities, but says such preachers have not really studied Islam in depth or qualified through a formal institute, are put on a pedestal by the institution and must then cement it, and were mostly very Wahhabi-inclined at one point. He says Asadullah al-Andalusi [?] once held ridiculous views about killing ex-Muslims and apostates, which he thinks he has since turned away from. He applauds converts for a step he thinks few born Muslims would take, mentioning Hamza Yusuf as one who studied deeply and to whom many are indebted, while noting that some converts with turbulent backgrounds embrace Islam as a cause.
machine3 min 15 s13:07on YouTube
19 Sep 2019Responding to Refutations
How should Muslims respond to ex-Muslims who hate God?
Meet hatred with love: hating God does not harm God, so there is no need to abuse such people. Many ex-Muslims are hurting, and Muslims can stay their friends.
machine4 min 55 s19:20on YouTube
18 Sep 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Is the hadith that singing breeds hypocrisy in the heart authentic?
The hadith that singing breeds hypocrisy in the heart is weak in every one of its chains, which run from Ibn Mas'ud to the Prophet in some versions and stop at Ibn Mas'ud in others. Mufti Abu Layth restates that nothing categorically proves music haram and that lyrics do not make it so.
machine2 min 37 s0:04on YouTube
18 Sep 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Which scholars held that music is permissible, and what did Imam Malik's school say?
Al-Shawkani, Ibn Hazm, Abu Bakr ibn al-Arabi and al-Fakihani all found no sahih hadith prohibiting music, and the people of Madinah, including the qadi Sa'd ibn Ibrahim, held it permissible, with some transmitting this as Imam Malik's own position. Only Allah and His Messenger are authorities, so a refutation needs a sahih hadith.
machine7 min 50 s2:41on YouTube
14 Sep 2019video
How do I answer Christians who say the Quran could be corrupted like the Bible?
Earlier revelation was not like the Quran: the Quran is a recitation meant to be preserved word for word, while the Torah was a message and laws and the Injil was the good news Jesus preached.
machine8 min 16 s0:39on YouTube
14 Sep 2019video
Is the Bible corrupted?
Yes, if corrupted means not preserved word for word, since they were never meant to be a recitation; but the general message of Jesus was most likely kept.
machine3 min 04 s8:17on YouTube
14 Sep 2019video
If God knew earlier scriptures would change, why not send the Quran first?
The earlier prophets were sent only to the Israelites and their books were never meant to be preserved word for word, so the question rests on a misunderstanding.
machine1 min 55 s11:21on YouTube
14 Sep 2019video
Is today's Bible the same one Christians and Jews read in the Prophet's time?
Quoting the Bible where it makes sense is fine. Whether today's Bible matches the one of the Prophet's time he does not know, though it most likely may, and the Quran does not address it.
machine2 min 16 s13:16on YouTube
21 Aug 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
5Pillars' coverage of Mufti Abu Layth and its article claiming he denies the afterlife
Mufti Abu Layth reacts to a 5Pillars article claiming he does not believe in the afterlife, which drew on a clip of him calling the Quran's afterlife imagery symbolic. He says no press is bad press and that he has addressed the issue in many videos.
machine2 min 38 s0:00on YouTube
21 Aug 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Is the Quran's description of paradise and hell literal or symbolic?
Mufti Abu Layth reads the Quran's imagery of the afterlife as symbolic, chosen to resonate with the people it was revealed to, while holding that life continues after this world. Allah also describes himself in imagery, and people are free to disagree.
machine6 min 32 s2:38on YouTube
21 Aug 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
How should I deal with religious circles that pressure me into beliefs?
Leave the judgmental bubble of religious circles and be true to your faith and yourself rather than letting people bully you into beliefs. He cites a shaykh attacked for calling for updated thinking and Usama Canon's regret at having deprived himself for fear of what others said.
machine6 min 31 s9:10on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Opening: al-Yaqoubi's heated public remarks about Mufti Abu Layth, and the title 'His Eminence'
Al-Yaqoubi criticised Mufti Abu Layth in a public gathering for mocking al-Nawawi, for his remarks on homosexuality and for calling himself a mufti; Mufti says he was surprised and partly flattered, and teases the title 'His Eminence'.
machine2 min 35 s0:00on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Shaykh Muhammad al-Yaqoubi?
Mufti Abu Layth likes al-Yaqoubi as one of the more level-headed and knowledgeable pirs, from a family of scholars, though he has only seen his generic talks. He recalls meeting him in Damascus two decades ago as an ordinary, respected academic with no entourage.
machine4 min 01 s2:35on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
How did Shaykh al-Yaqoubi become so influential in the UK?
After his earlier UK hosts parted with him, al-Yaqoubi found a devoted following in the Barelvi community of the Midlands and the north, learnt to avoid praising Deobandi scholars, and rose to prominence, wealth and power on its back.
machine3 min 57 s6:36on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Does Mufti Abu Layth regard Sufi tariqahs led by pirs as cults?
Mufti Abu Layth says all such tariqahs are in essence cults, though al-Yaqoubi's is a better and less harmful one than the usual exploitative pir. The SKT charity boycott, he says, shows how much power such shaykhs now wield.
machine2 min 36 s10:33on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Did Mufti Abu Layth mock Imam al-Nawawi?
Mufti Abu Layth says he did not mock al-Nawawi but read his own words, which assume as a given that young boys are prettier than many women and that anyone would be tempted by them. Al-Yaqoubi, he says, should have watched the whole video before judging.
machine3 min 50 s13:09on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Why did medieval scholars like al-Nawawi write that boys are prettier than women?
Mufti Abu Layth says al-Nawawi voiced a sentiment of his age, shared by many medieval Muslims and by the Greeks, in which attraction to adolescent boys was assumed; reporting this is not mockery. A Saudi critic's reply that many women are ugly, he says, proves the point.
machine3 min 55 s16:59on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Is al-Yaqoubi's edition of Sahih al-Bukhari really the most authentic copy on earth?
No special claim can rest on being based on the Sultaniyya, Mufti Abu Layth says, since every copy of Bukhari is. He sees the advertising as business, which he does not mind in itself, but calls the tactics problematic.
machine3 min 55 s20:54on YouTube
21 Aug 2019BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Would Mufti Abu Layth debate Shaykh al-Yaqoubi on Sahih al-Bukhari?
Yes: he invites al-Yaqoubi to a civil, respectful discussion because he rejects the claim that Sahih al-Bukhari is impossible to doubt. He expects it will never happen.
machine2 min 15 s24:49on YouTube
17 Aug 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
What does Mufti Abu Layth think of Shaykh Saqib Shaami?
Mufti Abu Layth respects Saqib Shaami for turning people lost to drugs and crime into good human beings and finds his influence in the East unique for a Western-raised shaykh. He sees him as focused on spirituality and tasawwuf rather than academic or contemporary intellectual issues.
machine4 min 47 s0:00on YouTube
4 Aug 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Mohammed Hijab's liberalism lecture argues like a sectarian polemic
Mufti Abu Layth turns to a university lecture by Mohammed Hijab on liberalism, which people had sent him and which claimed liberalism is baseless. He says the lecture seemed aimed at a Muslim audience and that, since Mohammed Hijab is intelligent, he is unsure whether he has not grasped the concept or is deliberately arguing to win points, but calls it a very poor job. He explains that the lecture argues against liberalism the way Muslims conduct sectarian debates: finding a figure the opponent supposedly reveres, such as Abu Hanifa, Ibn Taymiyya, Imam Malik or a Shia ayatollah, and quoting him to corner the opponent through compelling authority. He says this tactic makes no sense outside religion, where people do not feel bound by allegiance to such figures.
machine6 min 24 s0:00on YouTube
4 Aug 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Can people be moral without religion?
Yes: humans know that killing is wrong without scripture, which came to reinforce it, and secular European societies have reached ethics without God. He strongly disagrees with deriding that.
machine5 min 44 s19:02on YouTube
2 Aug 2019Amigo-Enemigo: A Sunni-Shia Dialogue
Rumours of a Sunni-Shia debate, and building bridges with the Shia
Mufti Abu Layth is not interested in Sunni-Shia debates: he believes the split is permanent and prefers building bridges, avoiding contested questions such as who was the better caliph.
machine5 min 23 s0:01on YouTube
25 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Who transmitted the hadith 'whoever changes his religion, kill him', and does the Quran punish apostasy?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran is ambivalent about those who leave Islam and that the call to kill apostates is nonsense; the report 'whoever changes his religion, kill him' in Bukhari rests solely on Ikrima, a Khariji whom Imam Malik and Ibn Umar distrusted. He introduces Abdullah Sameer's post as the subject he will answer.
machine5 min 07 s1:18on YouTube
25 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
How should Muslims respond to an ex-Muslim who criticises the Quran?
Attack the argument, not the person: Mufti Abu Layth says a genuine seeker deserves respect, that the claim itself is false, and that Muslims who call the Prophet a mercy to the world must show it in how they respond.
machine1 min 19 s5:07on YouTube
25 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does 'those who have not menstruated' in Quran 65:4 refer to little girls?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says the phrase refers to women whose cycles are absent through illness or irregularity, as Abu Hayyan, Ibn Ashur, al-Samarqandi, Abu al-Su'ud and Ibn Atiyya read it. Al-Tha'labi records that the verse was revealed about a man who divorced his wife during her menses.
machine3 min 57 s18:09on YouTube
25 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Did classical scholars really say Quran 65:4 includes little girls?
Yes, some did: Mufti Abu Layth concedes that commentators such as Ibn Kathir and al-Qurtubi wrote that the phrase can include little girls, which he condemns as a mistake. He says their saying so is not the Quran saying so, and the evidence lies in how the passage opens.
machine2 min 37 s22:06on YouTube
25 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the word 'women' in Surah al-Talaq rule out children?
Yes: the passage opens with nisa, women, a word never used of a six- or seven-year-old, just as boys are never called rijal, and the verses go on to envisage pregnancy, which nobody would expect of a child.
machine2 min 36 s24:43on YouTube
24 Jul 2019Quick Fiqh!
Can reports from Shia sources about Hasan and Husayn be trusted?
Mufti Abu Layth accepts the reports as factual, saying the Shia had no reason to invent earrings for their own Imams, and calls it hypocrisy that Sunnis accept Imran ibn Hittan, a Khariji who praised Ali's killer, as a narrator in Sahih al-Bukhari while rejecting anything from Imam Jafar al-Sadiq.
machine5 min 16 s31:22on YouTube
19 Jul 2019From the Mind of a Mufti
Was the first qibla really Petra, as Dan Gibson claims?
Mufti Abu Layth is not convinced that the first qibla was Petra: the statistical argument is a fallacy and Sunnis, Shia and Khawarij would never all have agreed on the Ka'bah. He still finds revisionist research compelling on some other matters and says Muslims should engage with it.
machine6 min 45 s0:00on YouTube
10 May 2019video
Which verses forbid or allow marrying non-Muslims?
Al-Baqarah 221 and the verse on the emigrant women are cited against intermarriage, while al-Ma'idah 5 allows marrying Christian and Jewish women. Imam Malik disliked it because a husband may not stop his Christian wife bringing pork and wine home.
machine6 min 53 s20:24on YouTube
4 May 2019On Current Events
Daniel Haqiqatjou's post that praying in a closet is a Sunnah for women
Daniel Haqiqatjou's post claimed that a woman praying in a closet revives a Sunnah and that this is better for her than praying in the Prophet's mosque.
machine5 min 33 s0:00on YouTube
4 May 2019On Current Events
Does a hadith tell women to pray in a closet?
No: the word makhda' means an inner sleeping chamber, not a closet, and such rooms were dark only because houses had no lamps.
machine3 min 53 s5:33on YouTube
4 May 2019On Current Events
Have Muslims really kept women out of mosques for 1,400 years?
No: women prayed in mosques from the Prophet's time on and classical scholars held many such views, so the '1,400 years' claim fails; Mufti Abu Layth doubts Haqiqatjou's scholarly training.
machine6 min 22 s31:44on YouTube
1 Mar 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Who has studied the Sana'a palimpsest and what is the controversy about?
The Sana'a manuscript is a palimpsest studied by the Puins, Asma Hilali, Sadeghi and Goudarzi, and people online have used it to claim that the Quran Muslims have is not the original. Mufti Abu Layth sets out to answer that claim.
machine2 min 37 s5:10on YouTube
1 Mar 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the Sana'a manuscript show that the Quran was changed?
The Sana'a manuscript and others such as the Birmingham manuscript date to the first century of Islam, when the Quran was the one text Muslims documented and taught everywhere. The Quran was too widespread and too distinctive in style to corrupt profitably, which is why fabrication targeted hadith instead.
machine5 min 15 s7:47on YouTube
1 Mar 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the Sana'a manuscript prove the Quran evolved over time?
The discrepancies in the Sana'a text are petty changes of pronouns and dropped words that serve no purpose, so they cannot be a deliberate evolution of the Quran, which nobody would have risked his life for. They are most likely a writer's mistaken notes.
machine3 min 56 s28:39on YouTube
1 Mar 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the Sana'a manuscript support or undermine the Muslim account of the Quran's history?
The Sana'a find confirms the traditional account: a first-century Quran, companions who sometimes erred as the hadith say, and Uthman's standardisation of one reading. The largest discrepancy is a dropped word that exists elsewhere in the Quran.
machine4 min 08 s32:35on YouTube
23 Feb 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Did Jesus really speak as a baby in the cradle?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran does not say Jesus spoke as a baby; the Maryam passage most likely refers to Jesus at twelve debating the priests in the Temple, as in Luke.
machine13 min 55 s1:15on YouTube
2018 · 92
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Who won the David Wood versus Mohammed Hijab debate on Tawhid and the Trinity?
Mufti Abu Layth calls the Wood versus Hijab debate on Tawhid and the Trinity monumental and worth watching, and says Mohammed Hijab clearly won. He introduces David Wood as an evangelical, anti-Islam preacher who has debated many Muslims.
machine2 min 38 s0:00on YouTube
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Did the topic of Tawhid versus the Trinity favour the Muslim side, and how well prepared was Hijab?
Tawhid appeals to reason while the Trinity is held by Christians as a supra-rational truth, so the topic itself favoured Hijab. Even so, Mufti Abu Layth was impressed by Hijab's thorough biblical research and impromptu quotation of the Bible, while Wood seemed unprepared.
machine2 min 37 s2:38on YouTube
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
What was Hijab's main argument against the Trinity, and did Wood answer it?
Hijab's central argument was that the Trinitarian creed defined at Nicaea in 325 cannot be shown in any earlier Christian source, which Mufti Abu Layth calls precise and well researched and which Wood failed to answer sufficiently. Wood seemed shaky and unprepared, and the debate leaned less on reason than it could have.
machine3 min 56 s5:15on YouTube
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
What does it mean that Allah performs salah upon the Prophet?
Wood kept asking to whom Allah prays if He 'performs salah' on the Prophet, which Hijab answered well as sending blessings. Mufti Abu Layth says pressing a linguistic point after it was answered, without knowing Arabic, was pathetic.
machine2 min 05 s9:11on YouTube
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Do Muslims accept doctrines as irrational as the Trinity, such as the uncreated Quran?
Wood's real challenge was that Muslims who mock the Trinity as irrational themselves accept doctrines such as the uncreated Quran and attributes that are 'neither God nor other than God'. Mufti Abu Layth says this was a genuinely tough point that Hijab did not fully answer, but Wood put it so badly that few noticed.
machine3 min 58 s11:16on YouTube
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
If Muslims accept miracles that defy reason, can they still object that the Trinity is irrational?
Muslims must hold the Quran to be in line with reason, because accepting miracles that make no sense removes any ground for objecting that three cannot equal one; consistency is all or nothing. Hijab denied that Muslims ever held anthropomorphic beliefs, but some did, though Mufti Abu Layth does not share them.
machine2 min 24 s15:14on YouTube
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Was Hijab right to show David Wood no respect in the debate?
Hijab's aggressive, loud and condescending manner, which he justified by Wood's record of bigotry, was used by non-Muslim commenters as ammunition and made Muslims look rowdy, while Wood stayed composed. Mufti Abu Layth sees it as damned if you do, damned if you don't.
machine6 min 31 s21:22on YouTube
24 Dec 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
What should Muslims learn from the Wood versus Hijab debate?
Thorough knowledge wins debates, Muslims must raise their adab, and they must be consistent: if the laws of nature do not matter for miracles, then there is no ground to say three cannot equal one. Clips about camel urine or suspended laws of nature send a confusing message.
machine3 min 47 s27:53on YouTube
30 Nov 2018Mothers of the Believers: The Wives of the Blessed Prophet ﷺ
Was Aisha really nine, as Yaqeen Institute concluded?
Mufti Abu Layth rejects the conclusion that Aisha was six at marriage and nine at its consummation, saying such a marriage would be morally abhorrent and did not happen. He disputes the claim that the question is not a moral one and says the chains of the report are unreliable.
machine6 min 33 s0:00on YouTube
25 Oct 2018Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Why does the Quran call Jesus the Word of God and mention the Holy Spirit with him?
The Quran uses terms of Jesus that it uses of no other prophet, the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, which Muslims do not take literally. He suggests this Christian rhetoric was perhaps meant to build bridges with Christians.
machine6 min 28 s0:05on YouTube
25 Oct 2018Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the Quran actually say Mary had a virgin birth?
No verse of the Quran directly says Jesus was born of a virgin; a verse implies it, and Muslims have differed on it. Mary was married, is never called the Virgin Mary in Islam, and most likely did not remain a virgin all her life.
machine5 min 10 s6:33on YouTube
25 Oct 2018Ponderings on the Holy Quran
What verses do Muslims use to argue Jesus had a natural birth with a father?
The Quran implies a virgin conception but never states it, and the scholars who held Jesus had a father argue from 6:85-87 and 6:101. People may believe either, but calling those scholars deviant is a huge stretch.
machine8 min 40 s11:43on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Introduction: Yasir Qadhi's khutbah on orthodoxy and why he is replying
Mufti Abu Layth introduces Yasir Qadhi's khutbah 'The Importance of Orthodoxy in Islam', which he believes was aimed at him, and says he will reply to its three points despite warnings of repercussions, while affirming his respect for Qadhi.
machine3 min 53 s0:00on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
What are the three points of Yasir Qadhi's khutbah on orthodoxy, and is hadith certain knowledge?
The khutbah's three points are that reinterpreting the Quran through reason or science is heresy, that doubting the hadith sources is heresy, and that a radical new interpretation amounts to claiming prophethood. Mufti Abu Layth agrees that rejecting hadith wholesale is wrong but says the hadith quoted for it is weak and that hadith is khabar ahad, not certain knowledge.
machine6 min 33 s3:53on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Is Yasir Qadhi's case for reading the Quran literally consistent?
The khutbah is internally inconsistent: it allows the Quran to unlock new meanings while condemning new interpretations, and it demands literal reading while itself reading 'the hand of God' non-literally as God's mercy.
machine3 min 56 s10:26on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
What is Yasir Qadhi's background, and where does the Salafi movement come from?
Qadhi's arguments stem from a hard-line Salafi formation, and Wahhabism in Mufti Abu Layth's account is a doctrine of literalism hostile to reason founded by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, whom he calls a deviant for permitting the killing and enslavement of Muslims. He traces the Salafi scholars of the 1970s to the movement behind the 1979 seizure of Mecca.
machine10 min 29 s14:22on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
What did Yasir Qadhi write in the leaked emails about the Quran's preservation and the theological schools?
In emails leaked by Dawah Man, Qadhi wrote that the letter-for-letter account of the Quran's preservation cannot stand and proposed discarding the theological schools to rethink kalam from scratch. Mufti Abu Layth reads this as a radical reinterpretation from the man now condemning them.
machine3 min 59 s24:51on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Are the Salafis themselves orthodox by their own standard?
The Salafis are themselves unorthodox: the orthodoxy of the ummah has been Ash'ari and the four schools of law, both of which they reject, so their appeal to orthodoxy against new interpretations is inconsistent.
machine2 min 37 s28:50on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Does the Quran say Ibrahim was thrown into the fire, or that the table was sent down to Jesus's disciples?
No verse of the Quran says that Ibrahim was thrown into the fire or that the table came down to the disciples, and 'incline them towards you' is the literal wording of 2:260. These are readings of the text as it stands, and calling those who hold them deviants is unacceptable.
machine11 min 44 s31:27on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Why does the Quran call Jesus the Word of God and speak of the Holy Spirit?
The Quran applies to Jesus terms it uses of no other prophet, the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, which Muslims do not read literally. Mufti Abu Layth suggests this Christian rhetoric may have been meant to build bridges with Christians.
machine6 min 36 s43:11on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Does the Quran say Jesus was born of a virgin?
No verse of the Quran states that Jesus's birth was a virgin birth, only implies it, and Muslim scholars have differed on it. Mary is never called the Virgin Mary in Islam; she was married, and some scholars held that she conceived naturally.
machine5 min 11 s49:47on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Which verses are used to argue that Jesus had a father, and does the Quran rule it out?
The Quranic account of Mary implies a virgin conception but does not state it, and 66:12 is not read literally by anyone, so demanding literal reading everywhere is inconsistent. The scholars who held Jesus had a father argue from 6:85-87 and 6:101, and calling them deviants is a huge stretch.
machine7 min 51 s54:58on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Is evolution compatible with the Quran?
The Quran's verses on creation in stages, growth from the earth, the single self and the couple of 7:189 are reconcilable with evolution, which Mufti Abu Layth calls a scientific fact established through genetics. Hawwa is not named in the Quran, and those who accept evolution should not be called deviants.
machine10 min 29 s1:02:49on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Is hadith the same as the sunnah, and is hadith certain knowledge?
The sunnah is distinct from hadith and reaches Muslims through the living tradition of fiqh, not from hadith books. Hadith are khabar ahad, not certain knowledge, so the Ash'ari and Maturidi orthodoxy does not build beliefs on them, and the Hanafis and Malikis reject solitary reports that contradict reason or their principles.
machine6 min 35 s1:13:18on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Is a new interpretation of the Quran the same as claiming to be a new prophet?
Equating a new interpretation with a claim to prophethood is out of order, since the Salafi movement itself is a radical reinterpretation that rejects the majority and holds that God has a leg and a foot. The majority of Muslims have always accepted metaphor in the Quran.
machine3 min 49 s1:19:53on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
When is a hadith set aside, and is rejecting hadith acceptable?
Mufti Abu Layth is not in favour of rejecting hadith in general, but follows Imam Malik in setting aside a report where it goes against the established tradition, reason, the principles of Islam or the Quran. He calls the khutbah dangerous and regrets what he sees as Qadhi's turn away from reason.
machine2 min 39 s1:23:42on YouTube
17 Sep 2018On the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ
Was the Prophet Muhammad poisoned, and did he die from it?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says the Prophet did not die of poisoning. The report in Bukhari that he felt the poison cutting his aorta in his final illness is, in his view, a fabricated story that contradicts itself and fails on its chain.
machine3 min 25 s0:01on YouTube
3 Sep 2018Responding to Refutations
Reply to Abdullah al-Andalusi: the 'white saviour' and the caliphate
Mufti Abu Layth mocks Abdullah al-Andalusi's call to establish the caliphate as a 'white saviour complex', while praising converts who devoted themselves to study.
machine9 min 31 s0:00on YouTube
3 Sep 2018Responding to Refutations
Who should I listen to about political ideas in Islam?
Anyone speaking about ideas in Islam should at least be a scholar; he warns young people away from caliphate groups and points to Hamza Yusuf's lecture calling the caliphate a myth.
machine4 min 22 s18:31on YouTube
1 Sep 2018BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
What is the Bukhari deathbed report in which the companions ask whether the Prophet is delirious?
The Bukhari deathbed report in which the companions dispute and ask whether the Prophet is speaking deliriously portrays the companions badly and is not true, Mufti Abu Layth says, and Sunnis hand the Shia a weapon by accepting it.
machine2 min 37 s15:38on YouTube
30 Aug 2018BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Backdrop to BukhariGate: a widespread debate, his training, and transparency
The criticism of Sahih al-Bukhari is a widespread debate that Mufti Abu Layth joins as a trained scholar who studied the book in full. The religion is not diminished by questioning it, and he refuses requests to keep the discussion private.
machine6 min 32 s0:01on YouTube
30 Aug 2018BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Replies to critics: Jonathan Brown, academic dialogue, going public, the Aisha debate
The problems with Bukhari should be discussed openly, because hiding them is what makes people lose faith. He finds Jonathan Brown's response emotional rather than academic and will take up the debate on Aisha's age.
machine7 min 57 s1:40:37on YouTube
3 Aug 2018Responding to Refutations
Why does Mufti Abu Layth call the Sunni Defence channel blasphemous?
Mufti Abu Layth says the group's own words, asking what is wrong with the Prophet being sexually impotent and defending the report of Musa running naked, are blasphemous. That, he says, is why he described them as he did.
machine3 min 50 s0:00on YouTube
3 Aug 2018Responding to Refutations
Is there an authentic hadith that a wife may never refuse her husband sex?
Mufti Abu Layth says no version of the report that a wife cannot refuse her husband is free of criticism, since its chains run through al-A'mash and Qatada and carry hidden defects. He challenges his critics to produce one that cannot be faulted.
machine5 min 15 s3:50on YouTube
3 Aug 2018Responding to Refutations
Can Sahih al-Bukhari be proven to go back to Imam al-Bukhari?
Mufti Abu Layth says it cannot be proven beyond reasonable doubt: the printed Sultaniyya rests on the lost Yuniniyya, the copies disagree, al-Saghani's claimed copy of Farabri's text is unseen, and Farabri himself was vouched for only centuries later. He challenges his critics to prove otherwise.
machine6 min 30 s9:05on YouTube
21 Jul 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Is mut'ah a matter of belief that divides Sunnis and Shia?
No: accepting temporary marriage or not is a question of fiqh, not belief, so Sunnis are unfair to attack the Shia over mut'ah.
machine3 min 15 s0:00on YouTube
8 Jul 2018Responding to Refutations
Is it rape if a husband uses religion to pressure his wife into sex?
Yes: Mufti Abu Layth says using religious threats to pressure a wife into sex is still rape and categorically haram.
machine3 min 12 s0:00on YouTube
8 Jul 2018Responding to Refutations
Thanks for the correction, but the chain is still flawed
Mufti Abu Layth accepts that three forum quotes were misrepresented but says he never relied on them: his case rests on the narrator's tadlis, which his critics have not refuted.
machine5 min 34 s7:00on YouTube
8 Jul 2018Responding to Refutations
Critics silent on marital rape, and a story about research and conclusions
Mufti Abu Layth says his critics avoid the real issue of marital rape, and challenges them to produce a sound chain for the hadith.
machine6 min 38 s12:34on YouTube
8 Jul 2018Responding to Refutations
Is it haram to pressure a wife into sex by saying God will be angry?
Yes: marital rape is categorically haram, and so is religious blackmail, using God's anger to get sex. He reads the hadith of the angels cursing a refusing wife as justifying that.
machine4 min 25 s0:00on YouTube
8 Jul 2018Responding to Refutations
Was al-A'mash a reliable hadith narrator?
Mufti Abu Layth cites classical critics who say al-A'mash committed tadlis, sometimes hiding weak narrators, and made many mistakes. This does not mean every narration of his in Bukhari and Muslim is weak.
machine9 min 28 s4:25on YouTube
8 Jul 2018Responding to Refutations
What is the point of checking a hadith's chain of narrators?
Chain criticism exists only to judge whether a hadith's content is sound; content against reason, the Quran or Islam's principles is a problem. Treating Bukhari as infallible is nonsense.
machine2 min 35 s13:53on YouTube
29 May 2018Islamic Eschatology
Accused of misquoting Ibn Ashur on the beast of the earth
Mufti Abu Layth says a scholar who accused him of misquoting Ibn Ashur accepted, after a civil discussion, that he had not, even while still disagreeing.
machine3 min 54 s0:01on YouTube
29 May 2018Islamic Eschatology
Calling it a misquotation is poor scholarship
Mufti Abu Layth says the misquotation charge reflects weak Arabic or a fixed mindset, and that scholars he consulted confirmed his reading of Ibn Ashur.
machine2 min 13 s19:25on YouTube
23 Apr 2018video
Who is Mufti Abu Layth's message aimed at?
His message is for the majority of Muslims who do not practise or feel Islam cannot stand up to reason, to show them that it can.
machine3 min 57 s0:00on YouTube
20 Apr 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Can people with very different religious views still talk with respect?
People who disagree on many things can still sit together, talk with respect and enjoy each other's company, and Mufti Abu Layth says this is the conduct Muslims need to return to, in line with the Prophet's great character.
machine1 min 53 s3:57on YouTube
9 Apr 2018The Voice of Reason in Islam
How do Muslims know Islam is true and other religions are not?
Muslims reject Hinduism and the Trinity by reason, relying on a shared human intersubjectivity that judges by practical facts; Mufti Abu Layth says the same standard of reason must therefore be applied to Islam.
machine6 min 34 s9:20on YouTube
9 Apr 2018The Voice of Reason in Islam
Was Zakir Naik right to dismiss evolution as 'just a theory'?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says Naik's mocking reply to an ex-Muslim did Islam a disservice, and that in science a theory can be an established fact, as with gravity, not merely a hypothesis.
machine3 min 52 s41:47on YouTube
9 Apr 2018The Voice of Reason in Islam
Did a tree really cry for the Prophet, and why does Mufti Abu Layth reject the hadith?
Mufti Abu Layth does not hold the crying-tree reports to be established: their chains are problematic and Muslims cannot call other religions' miracle stories absurd while accepting their own; the Prophet's greatness does not depend on a tree.
machine2 min 37 s1:17:02on YouTube
9 Apr 2018The Voice of Reason in Islam
If Mufti Abu Layth admires Qadi Iyad, must he accept everything in al-Shifa?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says al-Shifa was written to instil love of the Prophet in a context of insults and knowingly includes weak and fabricated reports, and that admiring Qadi Iyad, who himself disagreed with Malik, does not make him a clone.
machine3 min 57 s1:19:39on YouTube
1 Apr 2018Islamic Eschatology
Introduction: reflections on Shaykh Hassan Ali's video, and respect for him
Mufti Abu Layth introduces his reply to Shaykh Hassan Ali's video on the second coming of Jesus and affirms his respect for him despite earlier disagreements such as on jinn possession.
machine1 min 19 s0:00on YouTube
1 Apr 2018Islamic Eschatology
Is the second coming of Jesus proven by the Quran or by the fact that most Muslims believe it?
The second coming cannot be proven from the Quran, as Hassan Ali concedes, and the fact that most Muslims believe it only reflects what they were taught as children, as with folk tales of Ya'juj and Ma'juj. The hadith on it have chain problems and, more importantly, details that clash with Islam.
machine3 min 54 s1:19on YouTube
15 Mar 2018Responding to Refutations
Reaction to being called a probable kafir by Shadee Elmasry and others
Mufti Abu Layth rejects being called a probable kafir and apostate by Shadee Elmasry and others, says no pressure can remove him from Islam, and calls the readiness to throw people out of Islam a god complex.
machine2 min 36 s0:00on YouTube
15 Mar 2018Responding to Refutations
Is someone who denies a line of al-Tahawi's creed a kafir?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says this makes al-Tahawi rather than the Quran the standard, that Elmasry himself departs from al-Tahawi on several points, that Ash'ari creed does not make takfir of the people of the qibla, and that al-Tahawi wrote 250 years after the Prophet and is not an Ash'ari authority.
machine2 min 37 s2:36on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Why the second-coming debate blew up and what tonight's prelude covers
The talk is a prelude to Mufti Abu Layth's case against a second coming of Jesus, prompted by the controversy and the takfir his earlier statements provoked.
machine6 min 30 s3:54on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Reply to Abu Ibrahim's post and Hizb ut-Tahrir's double standard
Critics who have long opposed Mufti Abu Layth, including Hizb ut-Tahrir whose own literature treats the return of Jesus as a solitary report, have united against him; he puts this down to sectarian politics.
machine3 min 52 s10:24on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Critics sharing clips of al-Dedew and al-Awni: double standards in scholarship
Critics are circulating old clips and articles by scholars they otherwise reject; Mufti Abu Layth says this is cherry-picking and poor scholarship, and that others have held his view before him.
machine3 min 25 s14:16on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Why make a big deal of whether Jesus returns, and who is the message for?
Mufti Abu Layth says his critics, not he, made this a big deal; he has taught it for a year and stands by his position. He is addressing only one of two broad camps of religious people.
machine2 min 39 s19:00on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Why do other scholars not see what Mufti Abu Layth sees about the return of Jesus?
Others do see it but fear their own group; Mufti Abu Layth says belonging to no sect lets him follow what makes sense in light of the Quran and Sunnah.
machine2 min 38 s32:00on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
The second coming as a central Christian doctrine: Jesus returns as judge
The second coming is central to Christianity, and the New Testament's picture of Jesus returning as a judge matches what the hadith say.
machine2 min 26 s39:52on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Why would Jesus need to return if the Prophet Muhammad completed the religion?
Muslims have no reason of their own for Jesus to return; Mufti Abu Layth rejects the descent hadith because they clash with the Quran and other hadith, not from any misunderstanding of yanzilu.
machine5 min 15 s42:18on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
If Jesus comes down from the sky, what is the point of faith after that?
Siddina's answer was that once Jesus descends, taklif ends and faith is no longer accepted; Mufti Abu Layth presents this answer for examination and finds it confused.
machine2 min 39 s48:53on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Reply to Shadee Elmasry and Hamza Maqbool: 'probably an apostate'
Mufti Abu Layth rejects being called a probable apostate: no one can expel him from Islam by pressure, and declaring people kafir over this shows a god complex.
machine2 min 37 s2:03:34on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
The Creed of Tahawi is not the Quran; Ash'aris do not make takfir of ahl al-qiblah
Denying a line of Tahawi's creed is not kufr: Ibn Taymiyya rejected several of its points, it refutes whole Muslim groups, and Ash'ari creed forbids takfir of the people of the qiblah.
machine2 min 38 s2:06:11on YouTube
13 Mar 2018Islamic Eschatology
Shaykh Abdul Majid's civility; the 'Mufti' remark clarified; music in front of one's daughters
Mufti Abu Layth praises a critic's civility, clarifies that he objects to attacks on his qualification rather than seeking a title, and says that not wanting music or dancing before one's daughters does not make them haram.
machine5 min 16 s2:25:54on YouTube
8 Mar 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Why do you dress in a t-shirt and joke around while teaching Islam?
Mufti 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.
machine7 min 47 s0:00on YouTube
28 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Are witnesses required for a nikah in the Maliki school?
In the Maliki school witnesses are not needed for the nikah to be valid; witnesses or an announcement are needed before consummation. Hamza Maqbool's tweet said Mufti Abu Layth does not represent the school.
machine3 min 54 s5:06on YouTube
28 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
What do the classical Maliki books say about witnesses in a marriage?
The Maliki authorities he reads hold that a marriage without witnesses is valid unless it is meant to be secret; witnesses or an announcement are required before consummation.
machine9 min 11 s9:00on YouTube
28 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Is it fair to say Mufti Abu Layth has no knowledge of the Maliki school?
Mufti Abu Layth challenges his critic to a discussion on the Maliki school and says disagreement with his interpretation is fair, but calling him ignorant of the school is misleading.
machine7 min 04 s18:11on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Introduction: the Sunni Defence live session and its charge of an 'attack on the Sunnah'
Mufti Abu Layth introduces a live-streamed refutation of his video on the crying-tree report, titled an 'attack on the Sunnah', and says he will respond after giving the backdrop.
machine3 min 54 s0:00on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Why does he reject the hadith of the tree crying for the Prophet?
The religion is built on reason, so one standard must apply to all religions: a tree that reasons and cries cannot be accepted while other faiths' claims are called absurd. He also urged his critics to reject the demeaning reports about the Prophet, which they instead affirmed.
machine3 min 56 s5:12on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Does he believe in miracles?
Yes, miracles exist on a spectrum, but none ever defies God's own laws. Rare events can occur, but they always have a cause and a natural explanation, whether or not it is known.
machine2 min 39 s9:10on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
How does he view the Salafi movement, and is hadith narrator criticism a divine science?
The Salafi movement began as a courageous rejection of tradition but, once established, became as dogmatic as what it opposed. Narrator criticism is a human science, so it is always open to revision and disagreement.
machine3 min 54 s10:29on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Is it acceptable to criticise a hadith in Sahih al-Bukhari?
Al-Albani himself rejected around a dozen reports in Bukhari, so criticising a Bukhari report does not make someone a deviant. The salaf understood the Quran's miracles in several ways, and miracles had causes within God's natural law.
machine2 min 40 s14:23on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Does the Maliki school distinguish between hadith and Sunnah, and did Imam Malik ever reject a hadith?
Yes: the school of Madinah embraces the Sunnah while remaining critical of individual hadith, and Imam Malik rejected several reports when the practice of Madinah did not reflect them. He says he stated clearly that scholars differed on the report's grading.
machine2 min 38 s17:03on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Can a hadith narrated by Jabir alone be mutawatir?
No: mutawatir requires so many transmissions that a lie is impossible, which a report from Jabir alone cannot be, and he says the report is not even sahih. He defends following the critics who weakened the narrator rather than those who graded him reliable.
machine5 min 01 s19:41on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Is the chain Hammad ibn Salama from Thabit from Anas for the crying-tree hadith sound?
Mufti Abu Layth argues it is not: critics report that Hammad ibn Salama's memory failed late in life, that Bukhari did not transmit from him, and that Thabit was not the most reliable transmitter from Anas, Qatada and Humayd al-Tawil being ranked above him.
machine6 min 33 s26:01on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Are the Jabir chains for the crying-tree hadith through Isra'il, Abd al-Razzaq and Ibn Jurayj sound?
Mufti Abu Layth argues they are not: one chain rests on Isra'il, whom Yahya ibn Sa'id and Ibn al-Madini weakened, and an unknown narrator; the other on Abd al-Razzaq, criticised for errors from memory, and Ibn Jurayj, a mudallis whose 'akhbarani' referred to books rather than hearing.
machine5 min 13 s31:15on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
Did Ibn Ma'in consider Isma'il ibn Abi Uways and his family reliable?
Mufti Abu Layth says that although one transmitted opinion of Ibn Ma'in accepts him, Ibn Ma'in is also transmitted as counting the household of Abu Uways among the weak. He adds that Abu al-Zubayr was weakened by several critics, so none of the chains the critics brought is conclusive.
machine3 min 51 s36:28on YouTube
21 Feb 2018Responding to Refutations
What does he say to critics who accept that the Prophet was impotent, married a nine-year-old or was bewitched into clumsiness?
Mufti Abu Layth says these claims are untrue attacks on the Prophet's honour, resting on reports whose chains he has shown to be defective, and that critics who affirm them to win an argument are themselves being blasphemous. He adds that he does not support capital punishment for such speech.
machine6 min 14 s42:14on YouTube
15 Feb 2018From the Mind of a Mufti
Is it worth studying at a madrasa?
The madrasa is an excellent place if you bring critical thinking to it, and dogmatising if you do not; studying with several denominations, as he did, helps you see the good and the bad in each.
machine2 min 34 s15:16on YouTube
9 Feb 2018On the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ
Viral claims that Mufti Abu Layth insulted the companions
Mufti Abu Layth explains that he called the crying-tree reports unestablished, and only suggested that, if accepted, some companions exaggerated out of love; that is not blasphemy.
machine4 min 30 s0:00on YouTube
9 Feb 2018On the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ
Is it blasphemy to say some companions exaggerated out of love for the Prophet?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says suggesting that companions may have exaggerated out of love is not blasphemy, noting he alone defended Mu'awiya when he was abused online.
machine2 min 11 s16:30on YouTube
14 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
What did the Green Lane Masjid khutbah say about Mufti Abu Layth?
The khutbah called him a jahil who cannot be a mufti, said he mocks the deen, the people of tawhid and hadith, and blamed his followers' parents for not teaching them the correct aqidah. Mufti Abu Layth reports each charge with mockery and notes a well-funded Salafi organisation targeting one man on Facebook.
machine5 min 29 s0:00on YouTube
14 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Can the detailed aqidah taught today be proven from the Quran and Sunnah alone?
Mufti Abu Layth says aqidah as taught today was put together by Muslims over the ages, while the Prophet taught only simple belief. He challenges the maulana to a face-to-face meeting to prove his aqidah exclusively from the Quran and Sunnah, guaranteeing it cannot be done.
machine4 min 48 s5:29on YouTube
2 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Introduction: the critic's video and the charges it makes
Mufti Abu Layth sets out who the critic is and the critic's charges against him before replying to them point by point.
machine3 min 56 s0:00on YouTube
2 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Is the Quran created or uncreated? Why he calls the debate absurd
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the created or uncreated Quran debate is absurd: the Companions never discussed it, and it arose as a political dispute over the caliphs' authority in the time of al-Ma'mun.
machine6 min 35 s3:56on YouTube
2 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Shaving the beard: Qadi Iyad's view and the demand for one hadith
The view that shaving the beard is not haram is presented as Qadi Iyad's, and Mufti Abu Layth challenges the critic to produce a hadith teaching how to keep a beard. He adds that truth is not decided by the number of scholars holding a view.
machine3 min 53 s10:31on YouTube
2 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Music: the hadith on singing and hypocrisy, and scholars who permitted music
Nothing proven categorically makes music haram, and lyrics by themselves do not make listening haram. The hadith the critic cited on singing and hypocrisy is weak in every chain, and he lists scholars who said no sahih report forbids music.
machine10 min 26 s14:24on YouTube
2 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Anal intercourse: the difference of opinion and the chains of the critic's hadith
On anal intercourse Mufti Abu Layth says only that there is a difference of opinion: the majority held it haram, many Malikis did not and disliked it for hygiene. He argues that every hadith the critic quoted against it has a weak or disconnected chain.
machine11 min 53 s24:50on YouTube
2 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Refute me with sahih evidence: lying about the Prophet and the charge of misguidance
Mufti Abu Layth invites refutation but only on categorical evidence from the Quran and sahih hadith, and says quoting weak reports falsely attributed to the Prophet is shameful.
machine3 min 55 s36:43on YouTube
2 Jan 2018Responding to Refutations
Ruqya and the Quran as a cure: spiritual diseases, not cancer
The Quran is a cure for the spiritual diseases of the heart, not a replacement for medicine for physical illness. The Prophet told people to seek medicine.
machine5 min 20 s40:38on YouTube
2017 · 18
29 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
What happened with Nouman Ali Khan and Mahira Khan online?
Two online campaigns in the same week, against Nouman Ali Khan over allegations and against the actress Mahira Khan over a photograph, show the same Muslim attitude to responding, which Mufti Abu Layth sets out to examine.
machine2 min 39 s0:00on YouTube
29 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Was it wrong to publish the allegations against Nouman Ali Khan?
Releasing ambiguous allegations of abuse against Nouman Ali Khan, later said to concern flirtatious messages, was clear-cut haram and character assassination in Mufti Abu Layth's view. He calls the handling despicable and contrary to the Prophet's message.
machine3 min 57 s2:39on YouTube
29 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Why does it matter that the word 'abuse' was used about Nouman Ali Khan?
Calling flirtatious messages abuse misuses a word people understand to mean molestation or rape, in Mufti Abu Layth's view, and it was used to destroy a man who made the Quran relevant in English. He calls the campaign coordinated, driven by ulterior motives, and an act of Judas.
machine3 min 54 s32:43on YouTube
29 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Do Muslims online have the right to demand evidence about a scholar's private life?
The public is not a court and has no jurisdiction to demand or weigh evidence about someone's private life, which everyone has a right to. Mufti Abu Layth says those attacking Nouman Ali Khan cannot fill his place when the next generation needs answers about the Quran.
machine3 min 54 s36:37on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
What are the jinn and what can Shaytan actually do to people?
Jinn exist and Shaytan is a clear enemy, but his only power is to whisper, as human misleaders do, and Allah gave people the fitra and reason to resist. Any claim about the jinn must be met by asking for its proof in the Quran and Sunnah and weighing its consequences; an unexplained illness is not proof of a jinn.
machine7 min 49 s0:04on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Does the Quran say that Shaytan or the jinn can possess or control a person?
The Quran never says people lose their will; it commands believers not to follow Shaytan's footsteps, which presupposes the will and power to refuse. On the Day of Judgement Shaytan himself says he had no authority except to call people, so he teaches and whispers but never forces.
machine5 min 13 s7:53on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Is there any sound hadith that a jinn possessed someone?
There is no sound hadith of Shaytan possessing anyone; the Ibn Mas'ud report shows the jinn as a lowly creation fed on bones, not masters over humans. The guest's own investigations of 'haunted' houses and 'possessed' women found tricks and nothing else, and exorcism has become a big business.
machine6 min 34 s13:06on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
If doctors cannot explain an illness, could it be a jinn?
An illness doctors cannot explain is not thereby a jinn; that is a story made up without proof. The Quran attributes harm to Shaytan only in the sense that people follow his whispering, as in Ayyub's prayer, and forbids claiming what one has no knowledge of.
machine3 min 26 s19:40on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Which classical scholars denied that jinn can possess people?
Ibn Hazm held that claiming possession is a claim without knowledge and haram, since the Prophet spoke only of whispering; al-Tahawi noted that every taught du'a is against whispering, al-Razi said Shaytan cannot cause illness, and al-Shafi'i rejected the testimony of anyone claiming to see jinn, which only prophets can.
machine7 min 53 s23:06on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Did Ibn Taymiyya believe in jinn possession, and does his view have proof?
Ibn Taymiyya believed jinn possess people and treated them, but by his own rule of accepting nothing without proof from the Quran and Sunnah his claims fail: seeing something leave a patient does not prove it was a jinn. Levitating patients and beating the 'possessed' are tricks played on onlookers.
machine3 min 56 s30:59on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Why does the guest warn women never to go to exorcists?
Exorcists exploit women: the guest recounts a girl coached to feign possession to hide her lost virginity, and says many women have been made pregnant by such men in India and on a large scale in Britain. Every illness has a cure that must be sought by proper effort.
machine3 min 56 s34:55on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Did the Prophet use ruqya or doctors when he was ill?
When the Prophet fell ill Arab doctors treated him, which is how Aisha learnt medicine, so recited verses were never meant as a cure-all and the 'treatment by Quran' books misuse the book. The Quran's verses help against whispering, and one reads them for oneself without any raqi.
machine5 min 18 s38:51on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Why do jinn seem to afflict only people who believe in them?
Amulet writers, raqis and shrine touts run a business of lies, as the guest's stories of ambiguous amulets and promised sons show. Jinn never trouble him, atheists or non-Muslims, only those of weak belief, which he calls a lie against Allah and his Messenger that robs people of money and women of honour.
machine5 min 14 s44:09on YouTube
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
What do people mean when they say someone is possessed by a jinn?
The popular picture is that a jinn or demon takes over a person's mind or body, causing illness, obsessive or insane behaviour and broken relationships, supposedly to create mischief. Mufti Abu Layth presents this as the urban myth he will test against the Quran, the authentic Sunnah and reason, after the guest's closing call to disbelieve the whole business.
machine3 min 58 s49:23on YouTube
9 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Are Muslims obliged to establish an Islamic state or khilafah?
The guest says religion is a personal matter between a person and God, and believers have no obligation to obtain a society or a state, though if they have power they must run it by God's command. Prophets such as Ibrahim and Isa, and Zakariya, Yahya and Maryam under Roman rule, never sought power and remain examples.
machine2 min 10 s0:00on YouTube
9 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Did the Prophet migrate to Madinah to set up a state, and when did the khilafah end?
The guest says the Prophet left Makkah because he was forced out, not to found a state, and the khilafah rashidah ended with Ali, after which Umayyads and Abbasids were kings in all but name. The Quranic promise of khilafah was for the first generation only, and the 1924 abolition ended a powerless kingship, not a khilafah.
machine3 min 01 s2:10on YouTube
9 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Why is the call to restore the khilafah dangerous for young Muslims?
Mufti Abu Layth says the nostalgic 'Bollywood version' of Islamic history, in which a perfect khilafah existed until 1924, is a fantasy, since the khilafah rashidah never went beyond Ali. Guilt-tripping young Muslims with it and with Dar al-Harb rhetoric breeds the extremist narrative and needs tackling.
machine3 min 38 s5:11on YouTube
6 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Should scholars give fatwas based on minority opinions if it makes life easier?
In this clip Shaykh Akram Nadwi says scholars may give fatwas on easier minority opinions in minor matters of fiqh, since ease has always guided the jurists. Mufti Abu Layth speaks only at the end.
machine5 min 27 s0:00on YouTube
2016 · 8
21 Dec 2016video
Opening reflection on everyday miracles and an introduction of Mufti Abu Layth
An introducer reflects on everyday life as a miracle and introduces Mufti Abu Layth's studies in Damascus, Islamabad and Karachi.
machine3 min 56 s0:01on YouTube
15 Mar 2016video
Apostasy: execution as divine policy, tribal loyalty and treason in wartime
The speakers present the execution of apostates as tied to wartime treason and tribal loyalty in early Arab society rather than to belief alone, and say the Quran should be the primary reference in the discussion.
machine5 min 19 s0:06on YouTube
15 Mar 2016video
The verse on men having a degree over women, read in its passage
The verse about a degree over women is read by one speaker as concerning women in their waiting period, not a general ranking of men above women.
machine1 min 22 s5:25on YouTube
15 Mar 2016video
Western human rights, unquestioned presuppositions and the labels liberal and conservative
Both speakers say Muslims should question their own presuppositions and scrutinise Western values rather than dismiss or adopt them wholesale. One objects that Western moral markers shift every decade; the other that labels like liberal and conservative replace argument.
machine7 min 50 s6:55on YouTube
15 Mar 2016video
Riba and Ibn Abbas: his disagreement on riba and his combining of prayers
Ibn Abbas is reported as holding that riba lies only in delayed exchange and as combining prayers without travel or fear, which one speaker uses to show that labelling a view easy or liberal is not an argument.
machine2 min 38 s14:45on YouTube
15 Mar 2016video
Is morality innate? Language acquisition, divine command, and insecurity in faith
The speakers hold that the Quran treats humans as having an innate moral sense, compared to an innate capacity for language, and say faith should not depend on silencing those who question it.
machine6 min 32 s17:23on YouTube
15 Mar 2016video
Ritualisation of the deen and the angels' question about Adam: can believers ask?
The deen has been ritualised so that scholarly conclusions cannot be questioned, while the angels' question to Allah about creating Adam is read as a model that believers may ask questions.
machine5 min 12 s23:55on YouTube
15 Mar 2016video
Creation before Adam: Neanderthals, bashar and insan, and the formation of man
Creation before Adam is discussed through a distinction between bashar and insan and two ways of reading the fossil record. The speaker raising it says he has no verdict either way.
machine3 min 49 s29:07on YouTube
2015 · 6
27 Dec 2015video
Can I say Merry Christmas to non-Muslims?
Yes, saying Merry Christmas is permissible: old rulings against it came from a very different world, and in the UK Christmas is largely a winter festivity. Those who prefer another greeting may use it without feeling pressured.
machine3 min 20 s0:00on YouTube
6 Apr 2015video
Why was Mufti Abu Layth sent to prison?
Mufti Abu Layth was charged with aiding and abetting misconduct in a public office after contacting a police officer to arrange mediation for a friend whose children were missing, and served about seven weeks of a six-month sentence. He says he did nothing wrong and was treated unfairly for refusing to testify against the officer.
machine2 min 38 s0:10on YouTube
6 Apr 2015video
Did Mufti Abu Layth call a Birmingham school the Trojan Horse school?
Mufti Abu Layth says the quote was aimed at the police, not the school: he was asking why counter-terrorism officers shared confidential data about him with a school they themselves were calling a Trojan Horse school. He was not validating the allegations but questioning the officers' sincerity.
machine5 min 13 s21:06on YouTube
6 Apr 2015video
Why did some Islamophobic journalists defend Mufti Abu Layth?
Mufti Abu Layth says it was mutual interest, not support: those concerned with the school highlighted his criticism of the counter-terrorism officers. Being shared by someone does not make them a friend, and most of them would disagree with most of what he says.
machine1 min 17 s26:19on YouTube
6 Apr 2015video
LatestWhat is Mufti Abu Layth currently teaching?
An online fiqh course on the Risalah of Ibn Abi Zayd, al-Ashmawiyyah, a completed reading of Qadi Iyad's Foundations of Islam and a sirah series, with hadith categorisation, an Andalusi poem in hadith terms and a Maliki retreat planned. He believes the school of Madinah would make the deen a way of life for Muslims in the West.
machine5 min 18 s49:46on YouTube
6 Apr 2015video
What does Mufti Abu Layth plan to do next?
Continue teaching and counselling, start some form of voluntary work in prisons for people abandoned by society, and pursue international projects once travel restrictions after his release allow.
machine2 min 29 s55:04on YouTube
2014 · 4
2 Jul 2014video
How did Mufti Abu Layth become a mufti?
It was not planned: an interest in Arabic and the Quran grew step by step, taking him from self-study to Syria and then Pakistan, where he trained as a mufti.
machine6 min 16 s0:11on YouTube
2 Jul 2014video
What is Mufti Abu Layth's favourite Islamic science?
Fiqh, because he loves debate and argument between the schools, though he also has a strong interest in hadith and Arabic grammar.
machine2 min 33 s10:20on YouTube
2 Jul 2014video
Why does Mufti Abu Layth not dress like a traditional mufti?
The attacks do not bother him much: he holds his appearance permissible and wants to be a role model for Muslims who cannot relate to the traditional look.
machine2 min 59 s19:08on YouTube
2 Jul 2014video
What does Mufti Abu Layth hope to achieve?
Mufti Abu Layth hopes to spread inclusivity and compassion and a wider understanding of the Maliki school, which he feels the West needs.
machine2 min 50 s24:53on YouTube