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Jan. 29, 2015 - Louder with Crowder
20:17
Famous Imam Praises ISIS, Condemns Christians! || Louder With Crowder
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Everyone does love to dance to a happy song.
I know I do.
I know Fundip does.
And hopefully our next guest, who's been kind enough to come on the show, Imam Anjim Chaudhary, thank you for being on the show, sir.
Yes, sir.
Thank you for having me on.
No, we're glad to have you.
So, you were very quick, actually, in your response to do the show, which I was kind of surprised, considering I'm sure you know that I've been critical of Islam in the past.
What was your reasoning to just want to come on and discuss right away?
Are you just open to doing every program you can and getting the word out?
Actually, I hadn't heard of your show before I was contacted.
That may come as a surprise to you, but in general, I believe that...
It comes as no surprise to me.
I believe through debate and discussion we can reach the truth.
I mean, you know, there are many people who didn't agree with the prophets of God, you know, over the generations, and yet they changed their own lives.
Okay.
So, do you consider yourself a prophet of God?
Not at all, but I'm a follower of the prophets, but they are obviously our best examples.
Okay.
So let me ask you this.
I want to be fair.
Imam, Anjim, what do you prefer?
Amjim is good enough for me.
Amjim, okay, great.
So, of the over, you know, one billion Muslims in the world, how representative do you think your view of Islam is to be?
Would you consider it in line, relatively, with the mainstream thought in Arab Muslim countries?
Well, the problem that we face is that in the kind of one and a half billion Muslims that we have nowadays, they are divided into about 55 nations, and none of those nations Implement the whole of the Sharia.
Now, what that entails is that there is no education system of Islam nowadays in Muslim countries, and therefore the vast majority of the people are very secular, and they don't really practice, I suppose, quite similar to Christianity.
Right, so would you...
What I essentially say, I'm sorry, what I essentially say is don't judge me according to what the people say, judge the statements according to the Iran revelation, because that is surely the arbiter.
Sure.
So you would say, I don't want to misrepresent you, for example, I would say that there are a lot of people out there who claim to be Christian, but they're out doing drugs, partying, they're checking the Christian default box.
You would say that of many Muslims who don't really believe the teachings that you follow.
You would say they're secular Muslims, more or less.
Well, absolutely, yeah.
I mean, this is a problem that it's very easy to claim something, and Islam is a great religion, but not every single person doesn't understand it or practices it.
Well, let me ask you this.
Since you've got it up, who carries out Sharia in the world most closely to your beliefs?
What resembles your view, ideally, most closely right now?
Which country?
Well, I don't think any of them do, quite frankly, but I believe that what is the project In Syria and Iraq and places in Mali, Somalia, Afghanistan, etc., are doing quite well.
But of course, human beings make mistakes, and the best among them are those who ask forgiveness and change.
So Syria, Iraq, so ISIS, you think, is doing a bang-up job?
Well, I think that ISIS don't exist anymore in France.
I mean, to be fair, they dissolved in June 2014.
What you have today is a collection of different organizations and individuals and scholars who make up the administration.
And suddenly, you know, they've made mistakes.
But I think that internally, they're implementing the Sharia.
They're providing the basic needs for the people.
Yeah, many would consider genocide a mistake.
Let me get to the Paris attacks here.
You, I don't want to misrepresent you, didn't quite defend the Paris attacks, or maybe did you?
You justified them.
Why?
Actually, no, I didn't justify them.
What I did, I explained the mindset of people who would carry this out.
Okay, so can you condemn them then, giving you the chance to?
Well, I mean, if you just allow me to explain one thing, that insulting the honor of any prophet of God, whether that be Jesus or Moses or indeed Muhammad, carries capital punishment in Islam.
And what I was basically saying is that this is the job of the state.
Do you see that as a problem?
Let me ask you an actual question.
Do you see a problem with that?
Because let me tell you, do you notice there's no other religion in the world?
You can make fun of Jesus all you want.
I don't care.
Go live your life.
Fun dip, my producer here, is an agnostic atheist.
The only religion in the world is your version of Islam, which you claim to be the true version, that would bring death to someone simply for not accepting.
The prophet.
What kind of a god would treat people that way, not give them that choice, and face this religion, accept it, or death?
Well, I would make two points there.
First of all, that there are values which you will fight for and even die for.
I mean, obviously there is capital punishment in America.
You have the gas chamber, etc.
So there are things...
Not for drawing a picture.
Not for drawing a picture.
I'm coming on...
I'm coming on to that.
But what I would say to you is obviously there are different values which people consider a matter of life and death.
And for us, the sanctity of any prophet of God and the Quran is that.
And what I would say to you is that if you don't accept the inimitability of the Quran and the messengership of Muhammad, obviously you're not going to understand that.
But as a Muslim, we do understand that.
Well, and just like, obviously, you know, you don't understand freedom.
I guess you don't believe in freedom.
You'd be surprised.
I mean, I do understand.
Okay, so...
I do understand freedom, actually, because I was born in Britain.
I just turned 48 years old.
I'm a lawyer by profession, actually, and I teach comparative law, English and Sharia law.
So I think I understand freedom pretty well.
Do you believe in freedom of speech?
I believe there's no such thing as freedom of speech.
What we have is that Allah created for us.
There you go.
Hold on, hold on, hold on.
It's not fair for you to say that, say I'm a lawyer, but you're a lawyer who doesn't believe in the freedom of speech, so we have a fundamental difference.
Let me ask you this.
How weak is your God that he can't handle an insult from someone like me?
Why would your God be offended by someone as minuscule as me drawing a picture of Muhammad?
You can see why the people who aren't Muslim, they go, wow, that's a pretty weak God.
Well, let me just come on to that in just one moment.
I was just about to say that obviously your speech is curtailed.
Now, either it's curtailed by divine law or it's curtailed by man-made law.
You obviously have incitement and hatred laws and sedition laws and anti-Semitism laws.
So we both agree that you can speak, but there are restrictions.
We both agree.
I don't believe in hate speech laws.
I don't believe in hate speech laws, period.
Yes, but I mean you agree that there should be some restriction to people speaking.
For example, I'm sure you would say that you can't shout fire in a crowded theater.
Well, you mean the kind of thing that you do where you call for the death of...
Yes, so the point is that we agree that there should be some restrictions on speech.
The question is to whom this property belongs.
It's a threat.
That's not free speech.
See, well, we'll fundamentally disagree on that.
There's no way we can come to terms because I don't even believe in hate speech laws.
You're talking to someone who...
At the very least, and by the way, I appreciate this about you.
You're honest and you're consistent.
I have to be honest and I have to be consistent.
There's one thing I would like to talk about since we haven't outright condemned the Paris attacks.
Let me do this.
Let me close that topic on this.
I've been very outspoken against Muhammad.
I have talked about why I believe...
Listen, I'm a Christian.
I believe him to be a false prophet, personally.
And I have spoken about him in a way that many Muslims would consider mocking or dishonoring.
Do I deserve to die?
Well, actually, I don't think there's any problem with someone disagreeing.
And indeed, the Christians in the time of the Prophet...
No, no, I've drawn pictures of Muhammad.
Many of them did not accept that.
that.
But there's a difference, if you just allow me to finish, there's a difference between disagreeing with something, not believing that he's the prophet of God, and deliberately insulting him or making caricatures which are, you know, in some ways.
I've done that.
Do I deserve to be killed?
Well, I don't know about your history, and I don't know about what you've done.
I've only heard about your show when I was invited onto it, so I'm afraid I can't really answer that question.
I dressed up as Muhammad and performed a Three Stooges routine with my two young wives, one of whom was actually nine, to mimic Aisha.
Do I deserve to die?
Well, you know, you would need to be counted in a sharia court.
The evidence would need to be presented.
I can't pass the verdict here on your show, but definitely in general, it does carry capital punishment.
Any pictures?
Okay, so there's capital punishment.
Drawing any pictures of Muhammad capital punishment.
There we go.
That was the answer.
Not necessarily, because the thing is there's a difference between...
Right.
Drawing something and assuming by the individual that he's doing something noteworthy or something respectable and not understanding that he cannot draw.
And obviously what this Charlie Hebdo did, I don't know if you saw any of the drawings, but they were extremely nasty and very hateful.
And I think that anyone would be offended if you're a Muslim, even a non-Muslim.
I would agree with you that they were nasty.
I wouldn't agree that everyone would be offended.
Someone, I mean, they did that, you know, what we call the P-Christ was a famous piece of art, and you know what Christians did?
Ah, we kind of don't like this, and they turned away from it.
Can I just make one other small point?
I mean, there is often this argument that, you know, because they're doing it to everyone...
It's justifiable.
And I don't think that is the case.
I mean, if someone's committed a crime with one person, it doesn't mean that because he's doing it with everyone, it becomes justifiable.
I think that we need to control our tongue.
We need to have respect for each other.
And ultimately, I think the good world will be a much more safer place if that were the case.
Oh, see, but see, there's that veiled threat at the end.
The world will be a much safer place.
I think we should be honest of each other.
Civil, sure, but I don't think that should have any effect on safety, whether someone makes fun of a prophet or not.
That's where I disagree.
Yeah, but if you know that other people have the sanctity of the prophet as a matter of life and death in their own beliefs, then obviously that is something that we must take into consideration.
Now, you may differ with that, but that is the situation with Muslims.
No, I agree.
The situation, as you've spoken before, is convert, convert, or die.
No, it's not.
You can become, you can become, look, I mean, you know, you may know in the heart of Europe for 800 years, the Jews, Muslims, and Christians went side by side.
It was never the case of forcing the Christians or Jews to become Muslim.
They were quite happy.
And in fact, it was the Christian hegemony under Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand that led the Jews to run to the Islamic State in Africa for protection.
Yeah.
Actually, it's funny enough, in the Middle East, there's one place where Muslims live freely and open to practice religion as they choose, and that's Israel, and that's a big irony of our time.
time.
Let me ask you this.
Because your houses are being bulldozed down and you're being tough out of your home.
There are millions of refugees because of the herge of the occupying Jews.
Let me ask you this.
You talk about them living in peace.
So, okay, let's take that premise.
If you talk about living in peace, me as a Christian living under Sharia, I wouldn't have to pay any kind of a tax or anything like that.
We would have the exact same rights as citizens.
We would be traded zero differently, just like in America, right?
Actually, you know, the difference is that Islam treats you according to belief.
So you would not have to pay zakat.
You would not have to pray five times.
You would not have to make a pilgrimage to Makkah.
And, you know, many of the things which are incumbent upon Muslims would not be incumbent upon Muslims.
You would never be asked to join the army to protect the citizens.
But I wouldn't have to pay the jizya tax.
You would have to pay the jizya.
The jizya, incidentally, is much less than the Muslims pay in terms of zakat.
You would be able to practice your religion in your church, in your homes.
And, you know, nobody's going to be spying in your own private places, but definitely the law of the land in the public arena would be Sharia.
Right.
And that law of the land would result in the killing of a lot of Christians or Jews who weren't willing to be...
No, no, it wouldn't.
I don't believe so, because, you know, if you look at the statements of the Prophet, even on his deathbed...
He said whoever harms a dhimmi, i.e.
a non-Muslim citizen, he said he harms me and I will be a plaintiff against him on the judgment.
He said whoever kills one, you know, without any justification, he will never smell the paradise.
So, you know, these are protected people under the sharia.
Now what poor people may do...
It's not a reflection necessarily of what the Divine Law says.
Okay, I have two questions for you.
Because I want to give you the chance to speak, but I know you're also rushed for time to prepare for your Friday prayers.
And I want to be respectful of that.
What about ISIS and the crucifixion of Christians?
Where does that fall?
There's nothing called crucifixion of Christians.
But what we do have, if you look in the Quran in chapter 5, verse 33...
What Allah said in the Quran, and I'm paraphrasing, is that those people who violate the public sanctity, in other words, for example, going around in gangs, raping, pillaging, etc., they have capital punishment.
And their punishment could be crucifixion, or it could be cutting their hand and leg from opposite directions.
This is what it says in the Quran.
You can read that for yourself.
Okay.
That's fair.
Now listen, I also want to actually defend something that you said.
You were on a talk show, and someone asked you about suicide bombing, which you said is not a term you really use, but using your body for Allah is the way that you view it, which I understand, according to your beliefs, is fair.
And they asked you about the 72 virgins, and you made the point that 72 is often misquoted, right?
It's taken out of context.
It really can mean countless virgins, and to not limit your mind to 72, that Allah could provide as many virgins as one wanted, right?
Actually, I believe that, forget about the virgins.
Allah can provide you eternal bliss in any shape, form or way that He pleases.
And the hereafter is very different to this life.
The women of paradise are not the same as the women in this life.
So I don't think we can meet that as similitude.
Well, okay.
People, obviously, you were discussing the context of virgins, and your words were countless virgins.
Those were your words.
What I meant to say is that, yes, there are narrations which talk about partners in heaven, but ultimately, what I say, as a Muslim, we believe that God can show you with ultimate blessings and things in the hereafter.
Is virgins being included there?
Well, everything is included.
Whatever you want in paradise, you can have.
You know, this is the beauty of obeying Allah in this life.
Well, let me ask you this, though.
Culturally, what is it that's so attractive about deflowering innocent young virgins?
Well, there's nothing at all.
That's why I say to you, it's important for you not to make this multitude or the analogy with this life.
Because it's been accepted.
Well, if you just allow me to finish, the wine of paradise is not the same as the wine in this life.
Even the people and the partners are not the same.
You will not be the same.
So, you know, I don't think that this is a really valid comparison.
Even the Prophet said, whatever you think about, it's different than hereafter.
So you would say that's just completely been taken out of context?
No virgins at all?
So there's no concept of virgins for people?
Well, there is a mention in the narrations of the Prophet that you will be granted many partners in the hereafter.
What I'm saying is don't make the comparison with this life.
And there are many other versions and hadith in the narrations of the Prophet which follow up many other things in paradise.
What about those women?
Do they have a say in it?
Or do they just show up crap Well, I don't think, as I say, if you're talking about paradise, you cannot make the comparison.
You know, and I could quote to you from your own Bible and Torah about things in paradise, but ultimately we don't make the comparison because, you know, this is a little bit...
Well, go ahead.
I would love to hear those quotes.
Where in the Bible is it promised virgins?
I don't have the Bible in front of me, but obviously there are promises of many things in the hereafter in the Torah and the Injil.
And we can go into that.
I don't know.
I can prepare that for you if you wish.
Okay.
I understand where you're coming from, but nowhere in the Bible is the promised virgins.
That's the big difference between Islam and the Bible, and that's why I would like you to point me toward those.
But I do understand the point that it's difficult to compare our physical world as three-dimensional beings to the hereafter.
I think that's a valid point.
Before we go, I've heard you speak about this.
What about...
Under Sharia law, beatings.
What about hitting one's wife?
What about the lashings against Christians?
Again, you've kind of wiggled around where you said Iraq and Syria are doing a good job, so obviously we see that kind of thing there.
Where do you line up on that?
Can you just condemn any kind of striking women at all and any kind of beating of Christians as unnecessary and uncivil?
Yes, I mean, there's nothing called beating Christians.
There's nothing even called beating your wife.
You know, the Prophet is the best example.
He never laid a finger on any of his wives.
He didn't beat his wife?
Having said that, he never beat any of his wives at all.
But having said that, you know, the Qur'an in chapter 4 of the Qur'an talks about a situation where if your wife is disobeying you, continuously not fulfilling your rights, then it says, first of all, separate the beds.
So that could be, obviously, one night.
It could be a week or even up to a year.
I mean, even that could be up to a year.
It could be a long time.
And then after that, it says discipline.
But the Prophet said, whoever you discipline, he said, avoid the face, the private area.
Do not leave any marks on the body.
There'll be nothing more than pushing or something like that.
But, you know, Islam avoids...
Hold on a second.
Listen, I do want to let you finish, but I have a problem with that.
I don't care whether you hit the face or not.
I've read the Quran, Hadith, and am I mistaken where it says he struck her causing her great pain?
Let's say that's pushing Aisha.
Let's just say it's pushing.
No, no, no.
He never laid a finger on any of his wives.
I'm reading from your hadith.
And the thing is, you see, Allah said in the Quran that he's the best example, but he never laid a finger on any of his wise.
And, you know, he's the best example for us.
In the Quran, so you don't use the hadith?
Because it does talk about it.
There's nothing we mention in the Quran or hadith.
I've been teaching sharia for 20 years.
Yes, there is.
I've never come across any narration like this.
Well, we've got the quote right up here on screen and verse, and the viewers can make their decision.
It's only those people who are enemies of the wise, probably like the Shia, who quote something like this, but it's not authentic.
It's not authentic, so you would have to throw out that entire part of the Hadith.
It's not in the Quran, and the Hadith, many of them have been fabricated, and there's nothing like that at all, authentically narrated here.
Okay, so it is there, but it's just something that you wouldn't use, and that's fair.
We could make up a lot of things, but the point is, I'm saying to you, it's not authentic.
I'm not making up anything.
We've got it up on the screen.
Well, no, I mean, as I say, I mean, you know, if you want to find something, you will always find some people who are enemies of the rise of the prophet, like the Shia, who will say things like this.
What about Quran 434?
Yes, this talks about what I was talking about earlier, about if your wife is disobedient, then first separate the beds.
What I'm trying to get at is Islam tries everything to avoid any confrontation.
You know, in this country, two women are killed by their husbands every week because of domestic violence.
If Sam does everything to avoid that, meaning first of all, separate the beds.
Cool down after one night.
Then after that, advise.
That could be a long time.
Then after that, even if there is discipline, then avoid as much as you can.
Don't leave any marks.
So, you know, this is avoiding domestic violence at all costs.
You know, the man is stronger than the woman.
We all know that.
So we need to avoid him doing something in anger.
And if Sam deals with that kind of natural disposition in a way which agrees with our nature.
Okay.
Listen, I can respect that that is your view, and I hope that you feel I've let you speak more than I think some of my conservative brethren talk show hosts, because I am interested in what you have to say.
And you know what?
Listen, I think it's enlightening.
I believe everyone should have a voice at the table.
And Imam Anjim, we hope to have you back.
I would sincerely love to have you back and continue these discussions.
Well, thank you for being very respectful, and I look forward to coming back onto your show.
Thank you very much, sir, and we hope to see you soon.
And listen, I will tell you this, just like you hope I got into Islam, I hope to see you come to the cross one day, but that's because I love all my human brethren.
I hope you can respect that.
Well, I invite you.
Oh, we lost him.
We lost him.
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