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How to read the Quran
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Click a year to jump to itLatest answer · 18 Oct 2025
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestDoes 16:44 mean the Prophet explains the Quran, or that the Quran clarifies earlier scriptures?
Mufti Abu Layth reads 16:44 as showing the Prophet's role in explaining the revelation, as nearly every tafsir does; the guest says the verse is about the Quran clarifying earlier scriptures to the people of the book, and points to 5:15 as naming a single source.
machine4 min 44 s57:24on YouTube
Earlier answers · 88 · newest first
2025 · 3
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestDoes the Quran alone say what breaks the fast?
The guest says 2:187 shows that eating, drinking and intercourse break the fast by making them lawful at night; Mufti Abu Layth says the verse does not explicitly forbid them by day, so the Quran-only reader is inferring by reason rather than reporting what God said.
machine4 min 25 s1:42:01on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can the Quran be used to call the Prophet the best of creation?
The guest says calling the Prophet the best of creation is an unprovable inference contradicted by verses and reports favouring Abraham; Mufti Abu Layth says the guest rejects inference for that title while relying on inference to say what breaks the fast.
machine3 min 36 s1:47:07on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does 3:188 mean everyone who likes praise will be punished?
The apparent reading of 3:188 threatens anyone who loves praise for what he has not done, which troubled the Companions until the Prophet explained it as concerning tyrants and the arrogant; the guest reads it as a warning listing traits a believer must shed.
machine6 min 06 s1:58:33on YouTube
2022 · 1
19 Aug 2022video
What does the Quran say against the satanic verses story?
Mufti Abu Layth says al-Suyuti repeated Ibn Hajar's mistake, while the Quran rules the story out: the Prophet does not speak from desire and Satan has no power to speak in his voice.
machine7 min 51 s1:26:29on YouTube
2021 · 11
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
When should reason take priority over religious texts?
Reason always comes first, Mufti Abu Layth says, because every reading of scripture is already an interpretation; hadith dogmatism grew from Ibn Taymiyya's era and revived under colonialism.
machine9 min 07 s2:09:48on YouTube
13 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
LatestCan I skip fasting because of work, exams or health, and what do I do instead?
It is your call: make the fast up later if you can, or give fidya if your situation will not change, which Mufti Abu Layth bases on the plain wording of Quran 2:184.
machine6 min 38 s3:28:21on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Abraham really cut up birds that came back to life?
In the verse of Abraham and the birds he reads a symbol: birds nurtured by Abraham come to him from afar, a sign of the soul's affinity to God, rather than birds cut up and revived.
machine7 min 25 s3:19:16on YouTube
6 Apr 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Was the murdered man in the story of the cow brought back to life?
The verse of the heifer does not say the dead man was revived; like 'in retaliation there is life', it refers to lives saved when a ritual of justice averted tribal war.
machine2 min 57 s3:33:04on 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
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why didn't the Prophet explain every verse of the Quran himself?
Leaving the Quran undefined was a blessing, he says: a fixed tafsir would have restricted it, while leaving it to each age's understanding gives it timelessness.
machine3 min 12 s25:17on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran really say Jesus had no father?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran's elliptical text leaves readers to fill gaps, and that 3:59 on Jesus and Adam allows many readings; he does not believe in the virgin birth.
machine5 min 38 s27:52on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Is Sidrat al-Muntaha a real tree?
Mufti Abu Layth says the lote tree, Sidrat al-Muntaha, is symbolic language and there is no literal tree.
machine1 min 17 s1:48:43on YouTube
16 Feb 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran use metaphors, like calling people angels?
Yes, he says the Quran is full of metaphors, from God as light to the wall that 'wanted' to fall, and humans are called angels just as they are called devils.
machine3 min 06 s3:15:11on YouTube
12 Jan 2021Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why wasn't the Quran compiled as a book in the Prophet's time?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran was written but not bound as a book in the Prophet's lifetime because it was dynamic, allowing variations that did not change its meaning.
machine3 min 45 s1:17:34on YouTube
2020 · 44
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
Are the stories in the Quran meant to be literal history?
The guest argues, following Khalafallah and Ibn Rushd, that the Quran's stories are sacred literature and legend, using symbol and parable for theological ends rather than reporting literal history.
machine6 min 58 s1:02:23on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can I accept evolution and still take the Quran's stories as true?
The guest calls for reading the Quran wholesale as sacred literature, accepting evolution as scientific fact while holding that religion's symbolic truths, not science, ground human rights and meaning.
machine3 min 46 s1:09:21on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran speak in symbols and metaphors?
Mufti Abu Layth agrees with Ibn Rushd that the Quran speaks in symbols and that scripture is a kind of art, but asks whether the guest thinks the prophets and their stories are fictitious.
machine2 min 48 s1:13:07on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Are paradise and hell in the Quran meant literally?
The guest, following Ibn Rushd against al-Ghazali, says belief requires accepting the afterlife, not literal readings of its details; Mufti Abu Layth agrees the afterlife is symbolic but says the prophets' stories are of this world.
machine4 min 28 s1:15:55on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why does the Quran tell the same story in different ways?
The guest says the Quran's stories are set in sacred, not historical, time and follow archetypes that speak to the Prophet's own circumstances, which is why the same story, such as Lot's or the golden calf, is told differently.
machine4 min 29 s1:20:23on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did Jesus really speak in the cradle, and did the earlier prophets exist?
The guest says historians can be confident that Muhammad and Jesus existed but less so of earlier figures, and that the Quran's Jesus stories, such as speaking in the cradle, are dramatised; Mufti Abu Layth says no clear verse says Jesus spoke in the cradle.
machine5 min 37 s1:24:52on 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
Did angels really fight at the battle of Badr?
The guest says the angels at Badr are a literary description of God strengthening the believers' hearts, since the named Muslims who killed the enemy chiefs are known, and that the same reading applies to earlier prophets' stories.
machine4 min 06 s1:34:56on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Should archaeology worry believers about the Quran's stories?
The guest, as a self-described Islamic modernist following Fazlur Rahman, says believers need not fear archaeology, since the Quran re-attributes Jesus' miracles to God for theological rather than historical ends.
machine3 min 12 s1:42:25on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the story of Adam in the Quran a myth?
The guest reads the Adam story as sacred myth whose point is human dignity, improving on the Babylonian and biblical accounts by removing original sin and blame of the woman; Mufti Abu Layth holds the figures and events were real but told to appeal to listeners.
machine7 min 08 s1:45:37on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran treat every human life as sacred, even in war?
The guest says the Quran holds every human soul sacred, which classical exegetes on jihad missed; Mufti Abu Layth says Muslim scholarship must shift from outdated fiqh to ethics.
machine3 min 27 s1:52:45on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran actually say the miracles happened?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran often never states that a miracle occurred, as with the table for Jesus, and that the prophets were real though later assumptions colour them; the guest says the Quran rearticulates the discourses of its milieu.
machine5 min 43 s1:56:12on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why does the Quran tell the story of Dhul Qarnayn so briefly?
The guest says the Quran retells the known legend concisely to show the Prophet's knowledge from God, while stripping its Christian imperial ending; Mufti Abu Layth objects that its unusual wording is too vague for that.
machine5 min 40 s2:11:24on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why does the Quran give so little detail about some prophets?
The guest says the brief, repeated stories are archetypes recalled to console the Prophet, which audiences already knew; Mufti Abu Layth argues that following an archetype does not show a story was invented.
machine7 min 25 s2:25:43on YouTube
11 Dec 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Are the jinn real, or a symbol?
The guest says the Quran rearticulated a late antique belief in jinn to subordinate them to God, that he does not literally believe in them, and that Shaytan personifies human evil; Mufti Abu Layth agrees that inner impulses are personified as good and bad forces.
machine6 min 46 s2:41:04on YouTube
21 Nov 2020video
Does the riba verse prove that jinn can possess people?
The riba verse 2:275 uses the image of being struck by the devil as a frame of reference the Arabs knew, like the heads of devils in 37:65; it does not establish possession.
machine3 min 53 s17:05on YouTube
28 Oct 2020video
Did God really command Ibrahim to sacrifice his son?
No: in Mufti Abu Layth's reading the command did not come from God, and the Quran in Surah al-Saffat only reports that Ibrahim saw a dream and that his son urged him to act on it. The notion of sacrificing a son is traced to the culture of the ancient Near East.
machine3 min 58 s0:00on YouTube
28 Oct 2020video
Does the Quran say the sacrifice of Ibrahim's son was a test from God?
The verses say Ibrahim was truthful to his vision and that this was a clear trial, but never that God sent the dream or the trial. In Mufti Abu Layth's reading the ransom of a ram rescued the son and ended human sacrifice.
machine4 min7:55on YouTube
28 Oct 2020video
If God never commanded the sacrifice, why do the early sources all say he did?
Mufti Abu Layth agrees that no primary sources support his reading and explains it by early Muslims absorbing Israelite material, by the brutal environment of the age being projected onto God, and by the absence of anything from the Prophet saying God commanded it. He repeats that a God who stages a mock execution of a child is unacceptable, and that Allah never says the command was his.
machine4 min 55 s26:22on YouTube
13 Oct 2020video
Was Jesus born without a father according to the Quran?
Mufti Abu Layth leans to the scholars who hold Jesus had a natural birth, arguing that the verse refuting God having a child only works if every human is born of two parents.
machine6 min 11 s13:38on YouTube
13 Oct 2020video
Does the Quran say Adam was made from clay or from a drop of sperm?
Taking 23:12-14 entirely literally leaves one stuck, since the same insan made from clay is then a drop of sperm; the clay may refer to something like DNA.
machine4 min 24 s50:36on 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
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
10 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is there an order and coherence to the surahs of the Quran?
Mufti Abu Layth and the guest trace Farahi's school of Quranic coherence, which the guest illustrates with surahs that come in pairs.
machine7 min 04 s14:32on 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
What difference does it make that the Quran was first oral and only later written down?
The guest argues that the Mushaf is a secondary product that loses the context and immediacy of the oral revelation, like a printed map compared with live navigation.
machine6 min 59 s13:26on 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
Does 'Kitab' in the Quran mean a book?
Kitab in the Quran means divine writing or prescription rather than a physical book; the guest distinguishes the heavenly Kitab Mubin from the Arabic Quran, and Mufti Abu Layth agrees Kitab cannot mean book.
machine5 min 22 s22:36on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Is the 'Book of Allah' the same thing as the written Quran?
The guest argues that equating Kitab Allah with the Mushaf is a later interpretation that downsized the Quran's concept of a transcendent divine writing.
machine5 min 55 s27:58on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Was revelation words dictated by Gabriel, or inspiration the Prophet put into words?
The guest argues that Quranic wahy is non-verbal inspiration through the ruh which the Prophet put into Arabic; Mufti Abu Layth says he finds himself with those who hold revelation was expressed within the Prophet.
machine4 min 57 s53:07on YouTube
3 Jul 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
If the Quran wasn't a book, why is it on a heavenly tablet?
The guest says the one verse on the guarded tablet refers to 'a recitation', not an Arabic text, and that the Quran became Arabic for its audience.
machine1 min 49 s1:35:02on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can Muslims do ijtihad from the Quran alone?
Mufti Abu Layth agrees with the guest that making Islam Bukhari-centric is a problem, as his BukhariGate series argues. The guest says the Quran declares itself easy to understand and that whoever thinks it difficult or rejects its clear verses loses access to it.
machine2 min 36 s38:24on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does any hadith actually explain the Quran?
The guest challenges hadith followers to find a hadith that explains the Quran, says the Quran uses the word hadith negatively and sunnah only for God's law, and holds that descriptive reports are history, not religion.
machine6 min 37 s52:50on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Does the Quran abrogate its own verses?
The guest denies abrogation, reading 2:106 as about miracles replaced over time, since ayah in the singular never means a verse. Mufti Abu Layth says he is not against abrogation in principle but that 2:106 does not prove it and that no verse was ever lifted from the Quran.
machine9 min 12 s59:27on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What is the miracle of the number 19 in the Quran?
The guest says the number 19 proves the Quran is God's word letter by letter and that Muslims otherwise have no objective evidence for its divine origin; he recounts a Turkish scholar insisting the bismillah has twenty-one letters rather than nineteen.
machine6 min 34 s1:26:59on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
What numerical patterns does the guest find in the Quran's word counts?
The guest lists word-frequency symmetries in the Quran, such as dunya and akhirah 115 times each, month twelve times and day 365 times, and says the number 19 is a test that most people fail.
machine5 min 11 s1:33:33on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How does the guest's number 19 differ from Bible numerics, and how does he read 74:29-31?
The guest says 19 is a test most people fail, distinguishes his system from Ivan Panin's Bible numerics, and retranslates 74:29-31 as describing a precise, obvious mathematical structure rather than scorching the skin in hell.
machine6 min 30 s1:38:44on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Could the number 19 patterns in the Quran be a coincidence or a human habit?
The guest says the 19 structure cannot be chance or subconscious habit, that mathematicians cannot refute it, and that 19 appearing only in chapter 74 and being unveiled in 1974, nineteen times seventy-four lunar years later, is a prophecy.
machine7 min 43 s1:45:14on 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 does Edip Yuksel think of Sam Gerrans?
The guest respects Sam Gerrans as articulate but says his failure to see the number 19 leads him to invent arbitrary meanings for the initial letters, and that 19 is a divine test of one's bigotry.
machine2 min 38 s2:26:56on 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
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
2019 · 15
31 Dec 2019On the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ
Did angels really fight at the Battle of Badr?
Mufti Abu Layth says many take the angelic help at Badr as symbolic language for strengthened resolve, and the companions' later descriptions as storytelling or what they felt they saw.
machine7 min 42 s0:00on 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
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
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
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
How does the rule that a clear verse overrides an ambiguous one apply to Quran 65:4?
By a principle of usul the ambiguous phrase 'those who have not menstruated' is read in the light of the clear opening term women, which cancels any reading that includes girls. The Quran could have said fatayat but addressed them as nisa.
machine2 min 38 s29:58on YouTube
14 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Was the story of Musa and al-Khidr a dream?
Mufti Abu Layth reads everything after Musa and his companion fell asleep at the rock as a vision, which explains its strange details. Scholars who read it literally struggled to explain them.
machine5 min 40 s8:22on YouTube
14 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Is al-Khidr a real person who is still alive?
No: he reads al-Khidr as part of a vision shown to Musa, whose three events mirrored Musa's own life and mission. The boy was not really killed, and al-Khidr does not roam the earth.
machine6 min 19 s22:48on YouTube
8 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
How should Muslims read the stories in the Quran?
Quranic stories can be read as narrative and for lessons, but where they suggest the supernatural we must ask how to read them, unlike myths we never take as real.
machine9 min 32 s1:57on YouTube
8 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
If God can do anything, why not take the miracles in Quranic stories literally?
Reading the stories as suspensions of natural law means ditching reason, which leaves no ground to reject any myth; reason must be all in, though the prophets were real people.
machine6 min 26 s9:32on YouTube
8 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Was the hoopoe in the story of Sulayman really a bird?
Probably not, in his reading: the Arabic used of it is used only for humans, so the tafsir that it was one of Sulayman's intelligence agents makes sense.
machine6 min 24 s18:30on YouTube
8 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Did a jinn really bring the Queen of Sheba's throne to Sulayman?
Mufti Abu Layth doubts it: following Athari's tafsir, the 'jinn' here were a division of Sulayman's forces, one of three branches of his state.
machine6 min 26 s27:28on YouTube
8 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Did Prophet Sulayman steal the Queen of Sheba's throne?
No: he reads the story as Sulayman having a grander replica made from a detailed description, since prophets do not steal thrones.
machine6 min 57 s33:54on YouTube
8 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
What happened when the Queen of Sheba came to Sulayman?
She was shown a throne grander than hers in a mere waiting room and humbled, then became Muslim; her uncovering her legs on the glass floor was no obscenity.
machine4 min 18 s40:51on YouTube
8 Jan 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Did Jesus really speak as a baby in the cradle?
Mufti Abu Layth reads it as Jesus aged about twelve debating the Temple elders, as in the Gospel of Luke, which fits the history better than a speaking baby.
machine10 min 10 s45:09on YouTube
2018 · 12
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
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
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
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 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
11 Aug 2018Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Did the Prophet Nuh really live for 950 years?
Nuh did not literally live 950 years, Mufti Abu Layth says. The verse's use of two different words for year, sana and 'am, is deliberate and not just rhetorical variation.
machine3 min 53 s0:00on YouTube
11 Aug 2018Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Why does the Quran call the ruler in Yusuf's story a king but Musa's a Pharaoh?
The thousand sana follow the counting of Nuh's own people and the fifty 'am are years as we count them. The Quran relates narratives in the terms of their own time, as when Yusuf's ruler is a king and Musa's is Pharaoh.
machine3 min 08 s9:09on YouTube
2 Jul 2018Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Are the descriptions of paradise in the Quran meant literally?
The afterlife is real, but he believes the Quran's imagery of paradise was an encouragement suited to its first audience rather than a literal description. Anyone who takes it literally is free to do so.
machine5 min 03 s0:00on YouTube
15 Apr 2018Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Does the Quran's riba verse prove that Satan can possess people?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says the verse is imagery, read by the commentators as describing how riba-takers rise on the Day of Judgement or as a picture of consuming greed, and the Quran uses such images, like the zaqqum tree's heads of devils, because humans have imagination.
machine5 min 16 s7:47on YouTube
15 Apr 2018Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Should I believe something just because people say the Quran or hadith say so?
No: Mufti Abu Layth says the Quran itself appeals to reason, asking people to look, reflect and ponder, and condemns following forefathers blindly, so claims like possession must be tested against reason through the Quran. Someone reading the Quran without a cultural inheritance would never derive possession from it.
machine2 min 35 s19:34on YouTube
9 Apr 2018The Voice of Reason in Islam
Does the Quran have to mention something for it to be true?
No: the Quran tells people to explore how creation began and never claimed to exhaust knowledge; its statement that everything is created in pairs is a general truth, not a taxonomy that rules out creatures which reproduce without a male.
machine3 min 54 s45:39on YouTube
2017 · 2
20 Sep 2017Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and Superstitions
Does the Quran's verse about the touch of Shaytan prove that jinn possess people?
No: the riba verse describes how usurers will rise on the Day of Judgement or pictures their greed, and the image of Shaytan's touch is drawn from human imagination, like the tree of Jahannam whose fruit is 'like the heads of devils'. It is a misused verse, not a proof.
machine3 min 56 s58:35on YouTube
14 Sep 2017From the Mind of a Mufti
Can Islamic punishments like stoning and cutting off hands change with time?
Yes, in his understanding: the Sharia itself asks for punishments fitting the age, so today they would be replaced by penalties such as prison, following Maliki and other precedents.
machine5 min 03 s0:00on YouTube