Unknown Life Story of Mohammed Hijab! - “Many Threatened to K*ll Me!” - Towards Eternity

[Music] if the trajectory continues as it is then you have to kill 3 million Palestinian civilians in order to kill 30,000 Hamas Fighters I'm telling you respond to my arguments instead of trying to tell me off like a little boy trust me I'm not a little boy in every single man I'm a bigger man anyways I've got a few minutes left let me recite some Quran because I've done with this guy have you ever received death threats many people threatened me well I wasn't going to let that change how I felt or give me anxiety I gave you four questions I did the service sir of answering all of your questions you didn't even answer one of mine how dare you I know what the truth is and the truth is there's one God is the messenger if you bring that certainty to other people there was such a I felt such an obligation to do that that I just ran in my blood what is worship is the epitome the higher point of submission is the epitome of love as well if if I have if I have an ability here and I have a passion then when you add ability and passion then you get results and that's why and how I got into the [Music] dam alikum brother Muhammad hijab thank you very much for accepting our invitation we are very happy to have you with us I want to start by asking who is Muhammad hijab can you tell us briefly about your life honors on mine honestly it's a pleasure you guys have been extremely hospitable bringing me over here to beautiful country of Turkey and it's excellent City uh it's really the heart of the Muslim world and I have a lot of respect for Turkish people and Turkish culture I Really Love Actually the the strength that I feel with the with the Turkish Muslims in particular a bit about myself you know I'm a British Egyptian so I'm from Egyptian background you know I was born in 1991 in St Mary's Hospital West London I spent some time in Egypt as well but the vast majority of my life was in London I lived in a working-class environment Council of states and stuff like that growing up and then I went to secondary school I done an undergraduate and a triple Masters and PhD effectively now I'm just doing full-time daa let's start with Muhammad hijab hijab childhood what type of childhood did you have how was your relationship with your parents and siblings um in terms of my childhood though I mean we did live a kind of rough childhood in we I lived in working-class environment in Council Estates um basically where the government subsidizes your living and we kept moving moving houses like it was very unstable because I think I went to about five primary schools maybe six or seven even because we just had to keep moving house it was temporary accommodation moving from one estate to another another estate from one part of London to another part of London and there was a little bit of instability in that because obviously like you know you start making friends and then you make new friends and then you're detached and reattached and stuff like that maybe it gives you versatility and strength as well but it was quite unstable from that perspective and within that I actually went and spent time in Egypt and lived there as well uh my parents obviously I lived in a single parent household with my mother but I always had a relationship with my father as I got older I started reestablishing that relationship more and more getting to know who he was really as a person and strengthening that bond with with him right so I've got to sister both of them much older than me actually like 7 years and 14 years so I'm the youngest child I'm a boy I'm the only boy I did find it a lot of anxiety growing up though as a child like when I was S 8 years old I remember those times as a child you get attached very quickly and obviously in the same time period That's when I witnessed like you know my mom's divorce with my father like this was at the age of 8 years old I was at the time when it happened and I remember it very vividly you know I remember that happening very vividly um I remember all the these kinds of events very even though I was like you know 7even 8 years old at the time but kind of these events which are more painful in nature I think they're more memorable and there was a bit of pain and stuff but because my mom was there and my you know my S my older sisters as well were very very supportive I always felt like you know I had a belonging obviously my mom got remarried so I was reintroduced to like um her husbands and stuff like that and and I formed attachments to them so yeah when I was when I was younger and stuff I did have those attachments to uh my mother's husband but I knew who my father was I knew who he was and he wasn't my father so I I always made that clear I never called him dad or anything like that you know and um yeah there was that as well what about your religious upbringing did your parents were your parents Muslim and raised you as Muslims my parents are both Muslim alhamdulillah you know my mom did definitely raised me up a Muslim she Tau me she taught me how to pray she taught me how to do Salah and memorize parts of the Quran and stuff like and you know the extended family was a lot of them very very religious like and um there was the GRE but some of them very very religious and still are so what about yourself were you practicing were you devout I became practicing I think around like anything between 14 to 17 that's when I was going through my journey like I did have a period where I was going through like kind of doubts that was the time period where there was questions and I wanted to know like what what is this you know and it coincided with a t time period where I think cuz my mother then got divorced to the husband the new husband right when I was 14 years old when he left the house I felt a bit of instability once again like you know when I was younger younger it happened when I was 8 years old now it's happening again when I was 14 and once an attachment has been formed once again the Detachment has happened so like so that once again I thought I don't know what happened but I think it triggered some kind of almost an existential crisis actually at the age of 14 but I remember it very vividly cuz I was in year n which is in school I was in year n right before the gcsc time period and it gave me a little bit of time to actually look and investigate so that time period just to bring it back to the point was really a time period where there was a lot of s searching going on um I did want to know what was the truth I quickly came to the conclusion Christianity wasn't the truth I just thought like I mean who believes this stuff like as a child I really honestly thought I watched a few videos from mhmed after the third or fourth debate I was totally convinced and I saw all these pastors and Priests they couldn't even justify the Trinity they could like the basic basic basic arguments but I very quickly just threw that and said I'm not going to be a Christian you know atheism never appealed to me I always knew there was a God but my question was how do I prove that Prophet M was a true Prophet that was a question I had and so I went through it and I looked at the Quran with a very very very critical ey for about 3 years and I think a lot of the fluency that I have in responding to a lot had comes from that time period of looking and researching cuz I actually did the research for myself I didn't do the research for people and then when the time came and I saw people young people like me who were doing who are doing the same kind of soul searching I almost feel like it's an obligation to give them how I felt of relief when I found the answers myself to that so I started investigating the Quran again like looking at the and this and that and I realized that there's an answer to every single question and Sh that people have but then I start cating it for my own knowledge and stuff like that and I became passionate to be honest this is when I became passionate about religion when around 17 or 18 I became religious I became very religious compared to my peers in school I was I was praying I was you know really taking interest in the Quran a lot of them were not doing any of that so I became one of the most religious guys in that sense and it was a school which was a very was kind of a rough school to be honest with you in central London a lot of troubles happened there and stuff like that people getting hurt and whatever and I was in that it was in that area yes and I never engaged in G gang violence or anything like this I never engaged in that but it was very close to me like I saw it right in front of me do you know what I mean and I was speaking to these kinds of people and I was trying to make them religious you know and um I got my license my driving license when I was 17 years old a lot of them I drive them around and I said list you know I'm not going to let you pay for petrol but just let me read this book to you this book of s for example and I had a small book of s and I had small book of some of the miracles of Islam and stuff like a lot of them became Muslim so I started doing that very early on because remember I said I had a kind of existential crisis at the age of 14 15 16 when that left me and I think there was a pivotal moment when I went to Egypt and they were they were praying particular called and there was a beautiful like in Alexandria where I'm originally from a beautiful like Ramadan prayer it was like a million people on the roads you can probably see online it was shocking how many was like almost Mecca Medina levels and then I came back and I made Dua it wasn't an intellectual thing and I came back so solid in my faith because I felt so relaxed I felt so peaceful so tranquil I wanted to to disseminate that I wanted to give that as a gift to my friends to my close ones and stuff like that because it gives you the the best kind of grounding that you can have having this feeling of I know certainty I know what the truth is and the truth is there's one God is the messenger if you bring that certainty to other people there was such a I felt such an obligation to do that that I just ran in my blood anytime I get a chance to speak about religion to someone I would do it yeah and there was no cameras or anything I was doing in schools in play time in on in the car outside having religious debates with Christians when I was 17 years old and continued up until the point where I was um in an undergraduate level in University and usually they have these debates and this was an official debate with a Christian guy basically I remember I went and done that debate and it was very very very successful everyone was talking about it I said you know what this might be a talent I have so then I done another one another one another one I realized that you know what this seems to be my calling to be honest with you and then that's when I realized that you know if if I have if I have an ability here and I have a passion then when you add ability and passion then you get result results and that's why and how I got into the da you mentioned that you grew up without a father after the age of 14 right and I heard somewhere that the dawa became a father for you yes what what does that mean yeah because like I mean obviously my father divorced my mom when I was eight what the stepfather divorced my mom was 14 so now I'm looking for the father figure and so I started looking online so in that period of time when that was from 14 to 17 the figures that many of you have heard like Zak Nik and stuff and Ahmed and I was looking at those watching their stuff and consuming it quite rapidly actually there was lots of them so I start watching them I started liking it to be honest with you like I know the doubt Al became a very big figure for me because he started translating the Quran and helping me understand it at that time I didn't understand it so he's in a way one of the one of the main figures because he he introduced me to certain things about the Quran that I didn't know actually and he I think his service to the Quran is like the best service in the English language that I've seen in the last probably 30 years yeah it's phenomenal and to to the lay audience His Brilliant work he's done and he he had an impact on me there a lot of these guys they had a big impact on me and uh I I took it all in I took it all in and um and it did actually help me solidify my faith quite frankly now we want you to answer these questions shortly yes sure do you think Muhammad hijab enjoys doing the most reading Quran spiritual stuff spending time with family and friends and traveling I'll say these three things the best decision Muhammad hijab has ever made the decision to spend time with the Quran I think that's the best decision the worst decision mammad has ever made not starting my memorization of Quran younger the first thing Muhammad hijab would do if he got to Paradise I would like to meet the prophets the last thing that you searched on Google even even are you talking about non incognito mode as well no um I think the last thing I can I check can I check oh okay okay I'll be honest I I research because the thing is I know which is the but that next bit for some reason I've never applied it to memory like I don't I haven't memorized all of that bit that next bit yet so I was I was traveling obviously coming here so I was doing the i i Haven memorized that I memorized majority of du in that book of Muslim but this is not one of so I I had to look at it the moment where you felt extremely embarrassed the moment that you could never forget your shame I I think there was a time where I was trying to slam D when I was uh like 13 or 12 I was trying to slam dunk youall yeah some kid came behind me and tried to pull my trousers down and he succeeded and then he succeeded like 50% and I had to quickly like you know yeah what is the most unforgettable memory that you had at speaker corner I I actually tend to remember things that happened with other speakers and for example for me one of the greatest ones which I watched maybe 10 times 15 just for laughs and kicks and enjoyment was when there was a guy called Goodwin or Godwin I cannot remember his name but he was one of the most arrogant Christians and he was debating Adan Rashid and this if someone has not watched this they must watch this amazing very very enjoyable watch which is that he was shouting Godwin to ad Rashid and AD Rashid is a master of the Bible he knows this and he knows the comparative religion and stuff and he was just smiling and and letting him basically dig a hole for himself and he was saying David is not a prophet because they were talking about what does it mean to be a prophet and he said David is not a prophet show show me and he brought the Bible up where in this Bible David is a prophet you know and then and then Adan was letting him letting him say you know what he want it and then before Adan there even a Christian he came out he said David who was a prophet he read it from the Bible and everybody just you know gasped and made I was there I was watching it I loved that moment it really was one of the most enjoyable moments in spook's corner for me so his career was finished as well I think he left I think he left I think after that he didn't come back to the park in in the debates when you have time left you start reciting the Quran so why do you do this when you have you know arguments to maybe embarrass that person the reason why is because the Quran itself is is a very powerful medium by which and through which people can connect directly with the words of Allah sometimes stating the position is better than making an argument sometimes asking a question is better than stating the position or making an argument so we have to vary the tools here mix it up and the Quran speaks for itself if we truly believe that the Quran is the word of Allah then why shouldn't we at least insert a portion of the Quran in our speeches so I think it's very important that people who do debates or that do Daw they bring the Quran to the four so that's why I do it have we ever received death threats has anything ever bad ever happened to you because of what you do many people threaten me for example um the escapades that I had in Lester or hinda group there was a lot of threats coming from that but I knew that these were weak people and so that I wasn't really y yes I there was Vigilant but there were weak people I wasn't going to let that change how I felt or give me anxiety or something like that and then before that the rightwing racist English like for example the edl and stuff like there was a lot of threats and stuff from that but once again I didn't think that they were they're not an organized gang in the same way as other people are in England so I didn't feel like an imminent threat from them they had they were Hooligans and it's a different kind of threat the most dangerous thing in England I think are organ actually organized gangs because if some of those gangs weren't you dead you could be dead actually so I alhamdulillah I've never actually been threatened by that element of British society and if it was it would be a completely different game but since it hasn't been that it's been relatively manageable in your debates you official debates and videos we always see your facial expression as you know serious have you ever had emotional moment while you were debating you know lose lost control maybe cried I don't know that's us the debates I have with my wife in private to be honest debating people when you know like half a million people are watching or a million people are watching you can control your emotions like even even in that situation sometimes I get a bit frustrated and angry and these are usually some of the emotions I show excitement anger frustration these kind of things crying and stuff has never actually happened but as I say anger is one of those things that you try your best to control and it's much easier to control your anger with people you don't know in front of hundreds of thousands of people than with your wife at home when she's you know no one's watching and there's no active audience and so in terms of the arguments I've had which are most personal they have been the arguments I've had with my wife for example I used to think that that was a training for the da I used to think Subhan Allah just take it and that's how I used to try and train myself and condition myself now I know the truth and the truth is the opposite that the da is actually a training for that because the da is easier and so controlling yourself when there's no one there except Allah can see and obviously you and the person that's much harder for the average everyone has to deal with that what are you going to do are you going to explode are you going to shout are you going to curse are you going to go physical on your wife what are you going to do in a situation so I realized that really the of the Apex or the Pinnacle of self-composure and what they call Temperance self-discipline is when you're in private areas not public ones that's where the real test is that's where the real fight is when I watched your debate with you inside sou Africa she she just the other guy said something and you know H ttis say you know hold your shoulder so just just calm down so if he didn't were you going to attack him I don't know why he did this I mean no you were just Frozen just shocked you know he's just something so absurd and you just how can he say that and I think he want he was cutting me off and and he was making he was he was the one complaining about me cutting him and interrogating interjecting so I was thinking how can you cut me off after the speech you just gave about uh me doing the same thing you and your friend making these speeches so I was shocked because I spoke for about 10 seconds and he cut me off and I was explaining to him with academic references and I had thought about the answer and I thought this guy maybe he is sincere maybe he wants to hear an answer from the Islamic tradition the fact that he cut me off I found it quite rude actually I'm quite animated person it's very difficult for me to hide my emotions I'm not very stoic person even when Allah sends M Alam to pharaoh as you know in the Quran he tells him to speak to him softly but you on the other hand can sometimes speak very harshly when debating is your opponent worse than Pharaoh that you do this isn't there a possibility that you may distance the other person from Islam by breaking his pride aren't you AF fear of the responsibility of this you know a lot of people use this a like this is very well of quoted in the context of that so so both of you say to him Moses and Aaron a lenient word maybe he will maybe he will remember or he will fear now one has to remember this is in the beginning M was saying was given this command when he first in the first instance was told to go to Pharaoh it wasn't this was not the the continual tone of Moses to in fact if you look at throughout the whole Quran Moses issues threats to Pharaoh even though he was part of the oppressed persecuted group he was sarcastic to him for example he said okay and how do you you know confer your favor upon me when you you know you are the one who enslaved Ben is so he was being sarcastic he's being rhetorical with him asking questions undermining him to the point where he challenged uh frankly uh The Magicians and then they he came forward and there was a public gathering and a challenge and all these things and then it became more you know more more severe as he became more and more arrogant and rejecting of the signs so that's the case study of Moses and Aaron but even if you look at the verses in the Quran relating to the prophet Muhammad you know even there is I mean this you cannot remove that from the Quran in the sense that you have to fight the disbelievers obviously not all of them this is a particular kind and be harsh with them but there's in other verse if you were so harsh hearted they would have run away from you so there's a time to be and there's a time to be le now where do we distinguish between and how do we know when to be and when to be lay in so Allah says in the Quran this tells us do not have discussion or debate with of the people of the book except for the ones who oppressed among them so how do we know who's oppressed among them the ones who rejected and keep rejecting number one and or if they are mocking Islam like we know for example he says if you mock us we will mock you as you mock us so I think the way to know it depends on what the person is doing if they're coming with good energy humbleness if you know they're not trying to gratuitously insult you or your religion or your community because you're not doing that with them they're doing that with you someone says the f word to you or to your mother or to your father this means you're trying to hurt me and I haven't tried to hurt you if they start like this then you can return the favor if they don't start like this then you you shouldn't return the fav you should be humble with them just like they're humble with you so we we are being fair with them that's all we being if somebody wants to make a career out of attacking Islam make money out of it then they must be humiliated I think I want you to be sincere and open with me yeah if you were to die right now do you feel yourself closer to hell or Paradise what do you think Paradise definitely because I think look at the end of the day it's um there is a A in the Quran it says the ones who hope to meet Allah you cannot hope to to meet Allah and think you're going to the Hellfire you cannot like someone who's about to go into the battlefield like someone who goes like inba says someone who who has the two good things which is martydom or Victory you cannot have these feelings unless you think good of Allah and and theith says so you are as I am as my slave thinks of me if my slave thinks I'm going to take him to hell why would why would his slave think if you're doing what Allah has asked you to do the prayers and the fasting and the Five Pillars and you believe in the six pillars of Iman why would someone actually think I'm going to hell this could be problematic because as said in the Quran who would be the Hopeless of the mercy of Allah except for the disbelieving people so if if one thinks they're going to the Hellfire I would really question their hope of Allah's Mercy it could actually be a form of disbelief if they are doing if they believe in Allah and they believe in the messenger and they're doing what Allah has told them to do in the messenger if that could be seen as it could be seen as yet it could be seen as hopelessness of the of the mercy of Allah for someone to actually believe in that so in my case Al I don't have this how does Muhammad hijab spend his ordinary day I do I spend about 20 minutes each time so if I do both it's about 40 minutes frankly but it could take 30 minutes but it's about 40 minutes I do the Quran I have a quote of the Quran I have um obviously every day is different in terms of what I study so in the week I I would probably study about 30 to 40 hours minimum whether it's I'm talking about PhD or like I do a lot of durus and stuff like that almost every other day I have a different D with a different if it's not D it's we call Nash like lit you get the students of knowledge bring out a topic and then let them talk about it obviously the writing like so we've got a lot of writings that have not been published yet which are going to come up on sapiens in terms of PhD you have a supervisor so you you go and speak to the supervisor you speak to other academics the there's a lot of that going on I put a quota in place for gym my ideal is to go to to do weights three times a week Shadow Boxing where I do incorporate both kicks and punches are very important I try and do swimming in the week as well cuz it's better for the joints and I take my kids to swimming I spend a lot of time with my children and obviously my parents I spend a lot of time with my parents both parents my siblings my nieces uh so I spend in the week in the month I've seen all my family members you know in in in the UK and then the ones in Egypt I make sure to go and see every single one of them when I can obviously I don't go all the time but I'm saying if I can I will and I communicate with all of them you know like I'm I'm big into family I'm actually big into family if a young man comes to you and says I really admire you I want to be a knowledgeable Muslim just like you what advice would you give him i' say there's a lot more you can do than what I done because there was a lot of things that I could have done better you know I would I would just say look start with the Quran memorizing it understanding it and stuff because that's really the key to everything if if you see one of the themes that we've been speaking about about in the debates and stuff like that has actually been the Quran so I would say really immerse yourself in the culture Quran even if you do a little bit per day just make sure that you're doing Quran and you're you're going through the verses you understand something new you learn something new each day about the Quran it will change your life you will never regret it there's nothing better you can do with your time so that we would start with that and you'd have to have access to the classical Arabic because this is the language of the Quran so these two things come hand in hand and then after that obviously then you got the the legal schools of thought and the credle schools and all that kind of stuff which is very important as well but for me the a robust focus on the Quran is the is the most important thing that you can [Music] do

Channel: Towards Eternity

Views: 535,234

Keywords: islam, muslim, towards etenity, muhammad hijab

Id: Hnapn1ogj4Q

Length: 25min 17sec (1517 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 23 2023