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Pre-Islamic Arabia
18 segments in 12 recordings · 2017 to 2021 · 0 verified · 15 checked positions · history/pre-islamic-arabia · Feed
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Click a year to jump to itLatest answer · 26 Apr 2021
26 Apr 2021MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestDid everyone at the time of the Prophet accept Islam without questions?
The guest says early Muslims, including poets, had real critiques; Mufti Abu Layth says the deen should complement life rather than complicate it.
machine5 min 51 s1:10:04on YouTube
Earlier answers · 17 · newest first
2021 · 1
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestWhy does Ramadan fall in different seasons each year?
Mufti Abu Layth says the early Islamic calendar was kept in line with the seasons by an extra month, nasi, and Ramadan only began moving through the year after that practice lapsed.
machine5 min 14 s1:23:41on YouTube
2020 · 4
27 Oct 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Who were the Bedouin Arabs criticised in Surah al-Tawbah?
Mufti Abu Layth says the a'rab of Surah al-Tawbah were semi-nomadic raiding tribes not under settled rule, some of whom joined only as a power play.
machine6 min 11 s2:22:11on YouTube
16 Oct 2020video
Where did the rivalry between Banu Umayya and Banu Hashim come from?
The rivalry behind Karbala began before Islam between Banu Umayya and Banu Hashim; Mufti Abu Layth holds that Makkah and Quraysh mattered far less in pre-Islamic Arabia than later Muslims assumed.
machine4 min 15 s6:25on YouTube
13 Oct 2020video
Why do most Muslims believe in the virgin birth?
Mufti Abu Layth says the belief spread through the dominance of the Christian narrative across the empires surrounding Arabia.
machine1 min 50 s19:49on YouTube
14 Jul 2020live stream
Arabic poetry: Antara ibn Shaddad's love for Abla
Mufti Abu Layth reads and translates love poetry by Antara ibn Shaddad for Abla, including his lines of pride in his dark skin and his courage.
machine6 min 19 s2:01:41on YouTube
2019 · 10
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
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
8 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Why did God stop Abraha's army but let the Qaramita steal the Black Stone?
The Black Stone has no sanctity of its own: it was most likely a remnant of pre-Islamic stone worship that Islam kept as a ritual of submission to God, so its theft by the Qaramita, though wrong, was no great matter. Umar himself said it was only a stone that can neither harm nor benefit.
machine15 min 38 s0:00on YouTube
8 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Is the story of Hajar running seven times between Safa and Marwa true?
Mufti Abu Layth thinks the story of Hajar running seven times between Safa and Marwa was most likely added later to give the ritual an Abrahamic link, though he believes the Zamzam story is true. The Quran mentions Safa and Marwa only as a remembrance of God, without linking them to Hajar or Abraham.
machine9 min 08 s15:38on YouTube
8 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Did the Prophet restore the original rituals of Ibrahim at the Kaaba?
No: nothing was in Makkah when Ibrahim arrived, and although he and Ismail built the house of remembrance, Safa and Marwa are never linked to him. The Quran presents them only as symbols for remembering God, so there is no point guessing at older origins.
machine1 min 56 s24:46on YouTube
10 May 2019video
Did Islam invent marriage?
No: Aisha's hadith lists four kinds of pre-Islamic marriage, and the ordinary one of proposal and acceptance continued with Islam's approval.
machine4 min 59 s15:25on YouTube
2017 · 2
19 Oct 2017video
What was the riba of the jahiliyyah that the Quran condemned?
Riba is spoken of as three kinds: riba al-jahiliyyah, riba al-fadl and riba al-nasi'a. The riba of the jahiliyyah was a tyrannical loan-shark practice of compounding debt enforced by killing, torture and enslavement.
machine3 min 45 s6:12on YouTube
11 Jan 2017Mothers of the Believers: The Wives of the Blessed Prophet ﷺ
The question, Mufti Abu Layth's thesis and premise one: dating in an oral culture
Mufti Abu Layth holds that Aisha married in her late teens, not at six or nine. His first premise is that the early Arabs kept no precise dates, so ages and years in reports often conflict.
machine9 min 08 s7:50on YouTube