is again, I've read the Quran. I found
it inspiring. Um, it's been a long time.
This conversation is going to make me
want to read it again. So, but I was
inspired by it. I thought, there's truth
here. And Muhammad had to have been a
prophet in my mind.
>> Now, before I bring out my next guest,
let's take a quick look at a video of
his that I just noticed has been viewed
over 17 million times.
>> Jesus wasn't a Christian. He was a Jew.
And he didn't come to create a religion.
The Bible as we know it didn't even
exist when Jesus walked the earth. Not
when Paul wrote his letters. Not when
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John recorded
their accounts. The Bible was literally
compiled hundreds of years later by a
pagan emperor for political reasons.
That should tell you something. Now,
does that mean we throw the Bible out?
No. I love the Bible. I read the Bible
every day. It's the most important book
of my life. But it does mean we have to
stop worshiping it like it's God and be
honest with ourselves and start
listening to the truth that is behind
it. And if you doubt me, do your own
research. The Bible was literally voted
on by a bunch of politicians and bishops
in a room deciding what made the cut and
what didn't out of mounds of texts
centuries after the fact. That's like
building your spiritual life around the
minutes of a corporate board meeting.
And Jesus never said, "Read my book."
Because the Bible didn't exist when
Jesus was here. He said, "Follow me."
His gospel was not about denominations
and it wasn't about brickandmortar
churches. He was talking about the
church in the heart of men. Those in
pursuit of the truth, not the dogmas of
men. And it's important to note that God
did not write a single page in the
Bible. The words came through men,
deeply flawed men, written, rewritten,
translated, re-ransated, filtered
through kings, priests, and politicians,
and then argued over by 45,000 different
Christian denominations who all swear
they're the ones who are right for 2,000
years until it made it into your hands.
If that's not confusing, I don't know
what is. Now, this is something that
Christians do not want to address
because it destroys the entire idea that
the Bible is flawless and all you need
is this book that mainstream
Christianity has turned into something
of an idol. And for further context, the
Old Testament, God smiting people left
and right, is not even the same
personality as Jesus in the Gospels
telling us to forgive our enemies. We're
talking about two totally different
characters. It's like trying to mix a
Metallica concert with a Mr. Rogers
Neighborhood special and calling it one
genre or religion. The God of the Old
Testament is not the same God as the one
that Paul wrote about in his letters.
And neither are the same character as
Jesus from the four gospels. Jesus said
something really interesting once. He
said, "Be like little children." Kids do
not need theological degrees. They need
simple truth. The gospel was meant to be
clear, freeing, and alive, not locked in
denominational arguments and weaponized
like the woke left and the stone casting
right. Because the real gospel, the
gospel that Jesus taught, is not about
control, it's about freedom. So, if the
Bible is fallible, good, that means it's
human. And if it's human, then the point
was never the pages. It was the person.
And he still says the same thing today.
Follow me and be free.
>> Islam has changed William in the most
amazing ways. Most amazing ways.
>> We're here to educate humanity. And you
see, brothers and sisters, what we're up
against. But alhamdulillah, we're going
to continue striving to get the Da
Center, the educational center open so
we can go ahead and educate humanity on
the most misunderstood way of life. We
need your support right now.
This is the
>> Now, my next guest is a 9 figureure
entrepreneur, men's coach, and social
media creator over the past two decades.
He's built and sold multi multiple
multi-million dollar companies.
Welcome, Adam Red.
>> Hey, Eddie. Glad to be here. Thanks for
having me on the show.
>> How you doing, brother? Good to uh
>> I'm doing well. How you doing?
We al we also have joining us we have
Imam John Elder who serves as a
spiritual leader of Pillars Masid. Imam
John how are you?
>> I'm good. I'm good. We're blessed. Thank
you God for every moment for sure.
>> All right. So you got to see did you get
this chance to see the uh video I imam
John and let me start with Adam. Uh
thank you again for accepting the
invitation. Tell us how you came to
making this video. I mean, you you um
obviously put some thought into it and
what led up to you making it?
>> Yeah, it's a great question. I So, for
context, I've I've read the Bible pretty
much my whole life, or at least my whole
adult life. I've studied it. I can I
continue to read it every day. It's, as
I mentioned in that video, it's it's the
most important book, library of books
that I've ever read in my entire life.
Uh with that being said, I think what
has happened with modern-day
Christianity is that we have turned the
Bible into something of an idol where it
can't be questioned. It's um it has to
be treated like it's perfect, like
everything in there is
above reproach. And yet at the same
time, the book has come to us through a
very messy, imperfect process,
particularly since it's come through
men. uh and every single man is
imperfect. And so the idea that any of
us would create something perfect um is
a contradiction to me in my mind. Now I
think the greatest you know the perfect
source of truth is God. It's the spirit.
This is something Jesus taught about.
This is the truth. That's the
relationship that you have to have is an
intimate relationship with God. And the
Bible is a powerful tool for teaching us
important principles about how to
develop that relationship. But the
reality is is that it when I get light,
when I feel God's spirit in my life, I
know that I'm feeling something
profoundly true. But the second that it
filters through me in any capacity, the
second I'm communicating it, I'm writing
it down. It's coming through a very
imperfect vessel and it's going to have
its biases and it's going to have its
its own personal interpretations. And
that process, which is true for every
single one of us, I think is true for
everybody who wrote in the Bible. I
think many of them were deeply inspired.
They shared profound truths, but it was
coming through imperfect vessels to us.
And so, I think that puts the I think
this is important to understand because
it puts the responsibility on on each
one of us to study the Bible and to gain
our own relationship with God to connect
with God and his spirit for inspiration
and direction, not to outsource it to um
somebody else's interpretations, your
parents, your pastor, your whoever that
is. the interpretations that have been
handed down through the centuries of the
writers and uh those who transcribed it.
Instead, it's it's a call to all of us
to take our own personal journey, take
extreme ownership of that and and lean
into having a personal relationship with
God where he can direct us in real time
in a real complicated difficult world.
It was a very catchy title and it also
has a lot of truth here. There's a lot
of points in it. You start off with the
title and then in there you you you
start off with Jesus wasn't a Christian
and he didn't come to create a religion.
I thought that was very profound and I
would agree with that. Uh would you
agree with that John? Imm John.
>> It's all love man. Uh I appreciate the
opportunity to speak with both of you.
Um uh both great people promoting great
things in the world. Um yeah, I mean for
me whenever we look at the truth of God
throughout human history, it would make
no sense to think that God changed his
mind or gave a different message. Um,
and so it's important for us to
recognize that universality of the
spiritual experience as well as the
prophetic legacy, that golden rule that
drives us to look out for each other's
best interest to defend um those who are
weak and those who are marginalized and
to make a place that the society grows
better. And to um Mr. Alred's point
here, when you allow this
institutionalization
of morality and the truth of scripture
to become like some sort of hierarchy,
then you lose that original element that
we're all servants of God. And so that's
a very fundamental part of Islam as we
see it. Um we we believe Jesus Christ,
peace and blessings be upon him, was the
Messiah prophesied to bring back um the
the Jews that had lost their way. Um
unfortunately, they didn't recognize him
as such.
Yeah. And then uh go ahead. What um do
you want to add to that? Um anything,
Adam?
>> Uh no. I I agree with everything, John.
Everything you just said. What's the
best way to address you, John? I want to
make sure I'm being respectful.
>> John's good. Yeah.
>> John's good. Okay. Yeah, I agree with
everything you just said.
>> What's that?
>> I said Johnny Boy.
>> Johnny Boy.
>> No, I brought on I brought on um Imam
John because uh I see his story similar
to some of the things you're saying. He
also at one point I've known him for a
while he also um started to uncover some
of these things that you are talking
about and it's interesting here uh Jesus
because many people don't know that
obviously this term Christian did not
exist at his lifetime and this is simply
being Christlike and we would say yeah
that's a good thing to be Christlike uh
and we believe you know we we also have
so many similarities and that's the
whole essence the purpose between be
behind bringing you on the program to
kind of highlight some of these
commonalities because we have a lot of
division in the world today and I feel
there's elements who are trying to
divide us. So if they see conversations
like this obviously we don't have to sit
and sing kumbaya together but I'm sure
there's a lot of different things that
we can we can agree on and I'm seeing a
whole lot of things in this video that
we actually agree on.
So um yeah so just continue on there. Um
this thing about Jesus uh uh not being a
Christian and that he didn't come to
create a religion. This is interesting
because you know we believe that uh he
was following the way of Abraham and
before him the first man Adam and then
you have Noah and Abraham and he was
continuing that legacy of calling people
to submit their will to the will of the
the creator of the heavens and the earth
like in the Lord's prayer oh our father
who who art in heaven hallowed be thy
name thy will be done that's his rel
that way of submitting your will not to
thy will your desires but to God's will
doing what God wants you to do having a
direct connection with him. What do you
think about that, Adam?
>> Yeah. No, again, I agree with I agree
with what you're saying. So, the the
title of that was supposed to be a
little provocative, but the point of
Jesus wasn't a Christian to your to what
you just explained that Christianity
wasn't even a term at the time. It's
more to the point that Jesus wasn't
trying to create a religion, at least
the best that I understand it. Now, I've
gotten to the point in my scripture
study where I just read Matthew, Mark,
Luke, and John on repeat. Um, I just
rinse and repeat. I just go back uh
because that's the closest that we will
come to actually reading what Christ
would have taught. Everything else is
somebody else's interpretation. Whether
that's Paul or whether that's Peter or
whoever else it's writing, whoever the
other writers are, a lot of them we
don't even know. Um he wasn't. If you
just read the Gospels, you read somebody
in the character of Christ who was very
anti- religion for lack of a better
word. Like he calls the only
condemnation that he had for anybody was
the religious for those who claimed to
speak in his name. He called them
vipers. He said they were supplicers
full of dead men's bones. He said you
guys are hypocrites. You're the ones
going to hell. He had infinite patience
for the the harlots, for the adulterers,
for the publicans, for everybody else.
It's interesting to me that the only
condemnation he had was for the
religious, those who were filled with
this sense of pride that they were God's
chosen people and they could speak on
behalf of God. And I think as soon as
somebody elevates themsself to some
place of I'm the voice for God, I can
speak for God. I can tell everybody else
what God wants them to do for their
lives is where we've that that's like
the canary in the mine shaft. It's
that's the poison pill because what
Christ taught was revolutionary. He said
you don't need a hierarchy. You don't
need middle management between God and
yourself. You go directly to the source
and God will speak to you. You have your
own personal relationship with God.
That's where the real magic happens is
where you discover that relationship.
You discover yourself and you discover
God in searching for him. And again, I I
don't mean to disparage the scriptures
because I lean on the scriptures heavily
for for the framework and for the
foundation of my spiritual life,
including the Quran. I read the Quran a
number of years ago and I thought it was
absolutely brilliant. I enjoyed it
immensely. And I think that's one of the
things when we pull out of this, the
strangle hold that middle management has
in terms of these people in religious
positions that claim to speak for God
and tell you how to live your life. When
you can break out from underneath that
sort of coercion, you actually it frees
you up to connect with people in all
different types of spaces, different
religious lenses, different cultural
lenses. You're no longer divided by I'm
the good guy and everybody else is sort
of having a secondass experience
compared to me because I got the truth
and they don't. You can now look for the
truth in everybody's journey because God
loves all I believe fundamentally God
loves all of his children equally. And I
believe God speaks to all of us. It's
just whether we're listening or not. And
I think a lot of us have turned off the
listening part because we're not
listening to God anymore. We're
listening to a preacher tell us what the
Bible means or whatever any other
scripture means.
Hey, Mom.
>> John, you want to jump?
Yeah, I mean I I resonate a lot with
that. Um, you know, one of the things
that when studying kind of classical
texts of some of the writings of people
who who had kind of been involved in the
Christian traditions of Syria and
Lebanon back in the 700s and 800s, they
had this belief that actually the word
is meant servant of God and not some
wrestler with God. And that this that
you know submitting to God over
everything else and wrestling with your
own desires is really what that means is
that you're wrestling with your desires
so that you can submit to God. And so
for me, you know, it's like Christ came
to
remove that kind of idea that we're the
chosen ones and that really what it is
is we are responsible to make society a
better place. And so to allow there to
be this kind of elitist system of
religiosity
that was treating the temple as like not
only just like a kind of a place for
elites but also like a place that was
you know bartering and buying and
selling. That's where he threw up the
the table saying you know this is not
what this place is about. This is not a
place of worldly material. So this
radical reminding of everyone that was
there seeing themselves as like this
power structure that the power structure
the kingdom of God is in the hearts of
those who are his servants going around
the world improving the condition of
humanity with their with their
privilege. And that's something that the
Israelites had lost. And and one of the
things that people struggle with in
dealing with some of the kind of modern
situations. There's always been groups
among the Jewish community who were
adamant about keeping this covenant and
taking care of those in need. But then
there's also been those that allowed
this idea of being the chosen elitist
ones that that kind of created
unfortunately this kind of barrier
between them and the rest of society.
So, uh, I think that's, you know, that's
something that, you know, we as Muslims
very much see that the Messiah's purpose
was to bring it back to the fundamental
truth of rejecting your selfish dire
desire in favor of doing the will of God
in society, which means take what extra
you have to fill in the gaps of those
who don't who do not have.
>> Adam, you talk about in the video that
the Bible didn't exist when Jesus walked
the earth. This might you know um what
what was your thought process behind
that? Also was compiled hundreds of
years later by a pagan emperor for
political reasons voted by politicians,
bishops and others. What would make the
cut? Can you unpackage that?
You there's a lot there's a lot to that.
So clearly they had scriptures in the
time of Jesus and some people get hung
up. I've seen this in the comment
section where no the Bible existed
because Jesus was quoting scripture.
Well, he was he was using what was the
cultural authority at the time to teach
very important principles to people. And
they did have texts that had carried
with the Jews religious texts that they
they leaned on. But even those texts had
been selective. There was books that
weren't included in the Old Testament
that were left out. And then you get to
the New Testament, which doesn't exist
at the time of Christ. The Gospels were
written decades after Christ's death.
Um, a lot of experts aren't even sure
exactly who wrote the gospels, but the
gospels were written decades after
Christ's death when um, those who are
writing them are attempting to build a
religion. They're trying to create a
religion. And so, there was an agenda
with the particular text and how they
wrote them. At least it seems intuitive
that there would be. And then you have
the other books written at various
different times. And there was a lot of
different books that were not included
in the canonized New Testament. And then
you have Constantine, an emperor, you
know, a Roman emperor 400 years after
the fact after after Christ's death
that's trying to
codify his empire into one religious
framework for control. That was the
purpose of it. And and he was using
these texts and they had gathered
together bishops and clergy members and
stuff, politicians to vote on which
scriptures were going to be included and
which weren't out of mounds that hadn't
been included. Now there's more to it.
There was other councils, the council of
Hippo and the council of Carthage where
this was also done. But the council
council of the Nyian creed, the council
of Nika was really about how to
interpret those because at the time you
had all these fractious Christian
churches that were very powerful in the
empire. They had a lot of influence. And
so Constantine was trying to get these
leaders of these different churches to
come together and let's decide what is
the way to interpret it. Is it one God
with Jesus Christ, God the Father and
the Holy Ghost being one sort of thing?
Were they separate? There was different
things being taught at the time. There
was a whole bunch of different doctrines
that opposed each other. And he wanted
to create everything into one harmonious
uh framework that could be used to
manage and control an empire.
>> Uh John, how long into your journey did
you start to did you know a lot of these
things? Was this something that was
shock was shocking when you started to
go down this rabbit hole and how long
before you uncovered a lot? You knew did
you know a lot of these things before
you um when you were a Christian?
>> So not these type of you know these
these type of research angles have been
over the last 20 years I've come to know
those. But um whenever I was in 8th
grade, I got into some trouble. And my
dad comes from the 1950s when he was in
high school. So he's he's putting me in
the Catholic high school thinking that
that's going to solve my uh moral
dilemmas that I was struggling with. And
I had kind of a spiritual experience in
a car accident. Um and I went to talk to
Father Dan at the uh seminary about it.
And he was telling me this is my
calling. So I was interested to see what
that means. And the more I started to
study with him, then you know, one of
the things that I was kind of really
hung up on is the fact that there is no
history in the Jewish community of
believing in a trinity and that the
first two commandments are pretty square
up that that's the oneness of God. That
is everything like the pure monotheism.
And so um his answers were always you
know these are mysteries about God and
it could be that you know the Jews you
know they were never meant to carry this
on and that's why Christ would come and
so then I would say like well then why
would God take his chosen main you know
people on earth who are carrying this
message or receiving all these
revelations and divine interventions?
Why mislead them? Why allow them for
thousands of years not to have the
proper understanding of the nature of
God? So that was kind of that literally
was the whole nine creed thing was where
it really kind of made me think yeah I'm
not sure this is my calling. Um so I
kind of you know went into kind of a
unitarian approach where you know I
always resonated with the red letter um
writings of of Matthew, Mark, Luke and
John um because you can see the healing,
you can see the that spiritual purpose
that everybody needs and it's a shared
human experience and what makes us
special. Um
whereas when you read a lot about Paul,
Paul gets into weird ideas and it starts
to get into confusing contradictory
belief systems. Um and you can see that
kind of theological angle being taken.
So yeah, that's kind of how I kind of
started um in my journey. Um and I spent
about few years bouncing between
different uh you know denominations and
groups and then I just kind of I was
like just you know reading scripture on
my own and just um it it wasn't until I
had a chance to read the translation of
the Quran that I felt like well this
this answers all of my questions. This
makes sense out of everything for me.
Adam, your uh your thoughts.
>> Um, yeah. No, I I think we're we're
aligned. I think I read a book years ago
entitled when Jesus became God. It was
actually written by a Jewish writer and
he made this point that and and this is
a point that's made in the Quran. The
Quran is very inclusive of Jews and
Christians. It's uh you know that all
three of us are kind of essentially
coming from the same lineage and we're
coming from the same worship of the same
god and how that became distorted with
this idea of the trinity because what
happened is when Christianity came out
and said hey actually all three are kind
of one trinity doctrine sort of thing it
created a different type of god or a
different character than the traditional
gods that Christianity initially
Judaism Islam were all centered around.
And so it created this rift and this
division in the religious uh commonality
between the three the three groups. And
I think ultimately at the end of the day
the problem with religion is that you're
always going to have men who are
orchestrating it, organizing it,
teaching it, um converting people to it.
So it's going to be deeply flawed just
at a surface level. And then that's not
even getting into the level of
corruption that has been rampant in
religion over the centuries. You could
just just do a brief search of of how
religion has been used to absolutely do
horrific things. But people bought into
it and believed it because they were no
longer going straight to the source.
They were going to some filtration
system of somebody telling them this is
what God wants them to do. So go kill
these people or go you can you can rob
from these people or you can treat these
people like slaves or whatever that
looks like. You can use religious texts
in a million different ways of
interpretation. And we've often seen it
being used to do really terrible things
to other people. And I think at the end
of the day, religion uh the the
religious are in the business. And I'm
not saying all religious people. There's
a lot of brilliant, beautiful religious
people out there. I come from a very
religious background. My I love my
family. They're all still very
religious. Um, but in general, the the
power structure of religion is in the
business of selling pride and shame.
Pride meaning you're the special kids on
the bus. God likes you more than he
likes everybody else. Uh, give yourself
a pat on the back because you're doing
all the things we're telling you to do
and God likes you and you're going to be
blessed. Or you're not good. You're the
bad guy on the bus because you're you
don't believe the way that we believe.
You have another religious affiliation
or you don't believe in any religion or
whatever that looks like. or you're not
following all the rules that we've given
you to follow. And so therefore, you you
have people that are in kind of two
different camps that I see often in the
religions that I've been associated with
is people in a place of pride or people
in a place of shame. And they feel like
they're horrible. And both of those are
are really
both none of those things stand the test
of what Christ actually taught in the
four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and
John.
On that note, I would say that, you
know, this is one of the things that has
always resonated with me. Um, you know,
that what has happened throughout the
history of the Jewish tradition and what
kind of got established with the kind of
uh church, you know, kingdom empire
relationship and the Roman Empire. Um,
there was always this hands-off
approach. I mean there's a literal verse
of of the surah had in the Quran that
says this monasticism or this holy
ordainment or this official position to
intercede and talk on behalf of God is
something people invented and God never
decreed that. Um, and so I have to tell
people when they come, when we have
classes from schools, when we have, uh,
folks from different churches that come
visit us. Uh, I tell them I'm called
imam, but I'm not like ordained as a
holy person because God is the one who
knows what's in the hearts. For all we
know, the guy who works at such and such
or drives Uber or whatever is more pious
than myself. And I should never assume
just cuz I'm teaching people some know.
So I'm basically a person of knowledge
who studied scripture and I have a
reference point but you should challenge
my knowledge and you should compare it
to the back to what you said Adam is
like what's the reference like how do
you know that rather than because I'm
the holy man which of course God only
knows if I am as holy as I would hope
hopefully assume that I am. Um so this
is I think something that within our
tradition we have it as like a
fundamental foundation throughout
history but even now you know like
within Saudi Arabia when they came as a
state um I guess a couple hundred years
ago they started to try to claim and you
know a lot of people didn't you know go
along with that many people did just
think well because the original holy
sites that prophet Muhammad peace and
blessings be upon him came you know that
they they have been allowed to have that
authority So now that somehow gives them
some privilege. Um and of course
previous empires the Ottomans felt
themselves as such and they tried to but
always the scholars were saying there's
this phrase called Sultan the scholar or
the preacher who's connected to the
government. So anytime this almost
sounds secular, you know, it's
interesting is that anytime the
government uh power structure that
there's supposed people of scripture and
people of knowledge, people of uh
religious leadership when they would be
connected that would always be seen as a
as a doubt that like that that makes you
less trustworthy cuz you're with the
power structure. So we had famous
scholars who were beat and you know made
an example of because they would not
allow the government to to you know
bring them in as like their official you
know religious authority and and so
that's something that I think uh you
know and I've met plenty of really good
pastor friends of mine who who and I
think that's one of the things about the
Baptist church is to try to stay but
then you have the Southern Baptist
Convention and they've taken it at a
different level there But um I've met a
lot of pastors who do feel the important
onus to maintain that because Christ
himself did indicate that.
>> Since we're using some uh some Arabic
terms, uh John, Imam John, can you tell
us uh if for the audience um and if Adam
already didn't know these terms, what
they mean? We you said Islam and Muslim.
What did can you unpackage it? What does
Islam actually mean? And what does
Muslim mean? The actual word, what does
it mean?
>> So yeah, that's I mean that's the
fundamental truth. So Islam is the
natural relationship between creator and
creation. It is it is submission. So God
is the creator and then everything else
is the creation. So the creation all of
it by natural reality is fundamentally
doing what it was designed to do. The
human being is unique in that we are
responsible to take decisions and we
will be held accountable in in judgment
after we die and we're resurrected on
the day of judgment. So Islam is to do
the will of God. So a Muslim is one is a
human being who claims that they are
committing themselves to doing the will
of God. Um so that's something we would
say by description would never have
changed between Adam and Noah and
Abraham. And I remember one interfaith
uh broadcast that was in Jerusalem back
in the '9s um where the rabbi, the the
head senior rabbi, he said, "Yeah, what
we call I think they called it uh the
covenant of Benin, the Noah covenant was
do the will of God and be a servant of
God." And so he said this is clearly
what Muslims call themselves and we
understand that to be the original
before Isaac and the um 12 tribes of
Israel. And then we started to formulate
ourselves according to the identity of
Israel. Um so yeah, so that's that's
pretty much what it means. And as as you
mentioned in the Lord's prayer, uh thy
will be done on earth as it is in
heaven. That's pretty much and I think
Christ in uh Matthew 22
when he was asked, "Oh Lord, oh Lord,"
and the man said, "Whoever says to me,
Lord, Lord, will not go to the kingdom
of heaven, but he who does the will of
my father will go to the kingdom of
heaven." So he was emphasizing this
point. Adam, have you ever um met with a
Muslim or a Muslim imam? Do you have any
Muslim friends?
>> I I've traveled a lot in my life. Um and
so I've spent a lot of time in Muslim
countries. I've had a lot of
conversations with Muslims.
>> Um by and large just found those
conversations to be really rewarding and
fulfilling. Um
and this is just anecdotal, right? It's
just my personal experiences. Uh, but
I've been interested in religion in
general, all different religions and why
people think the way they do. And um,
I've read a lot of the Buddhist, you
know, a lot of Buddhist writings. I've
read a lot of the Hindu scriptures. I've
read the Quran. Um, and then I've read
the Bible. And I grew up Mormon. So,
it's interesting cuz, you know, you have
these religions, Christianity, that's
very exclusive. If you don't say Jesus
as loud as I do, you're not going to be
saved sort of thing. Um, and then within
that religion, you have all these
different smaller groups. Mormons being
one of them. They're like, actually, no,
you have to say our version of Jesus.
You can't just say your version or
you're not included. So, you have to say
the Mormon Jesus, whatever that exactly
means, is sometimes hard to define
versus just generally saying Jesus if
you really want to be saved. And then
everybody else who isn't saying Jesus
doesn't stand a chance. And none of that
has made any sense to me. I try to use
God gave us a brain for a reason. And he
gave us the ability to, you know, this
conscious state that we're in is really
kind of three things. We have the
ability to observe. We have the ability
to assign meaning to what we observe.
And then we get to go and create. God
has given us incredible power to go
create. We get to create whatever life
we want to create. We get to create. We
literally get to create life. When you
have a woman and you build a family, we
get to go create this whole thing. He's
given us this incredible experience in
life to go make things and to be able to
assign meaning to things. And I think,
you know, religion tries to stifle that.
And I agree with everything that you
said, John. It is about following God's
will. But the I think the issue is that
what is God's will? Because you're going
to have a lot of different people saying
this is what God's will is. You know, is
it is it the Ten Commandments? Is it,
you know, all of the rules that came
associated kind of built off the the law
of Moses and all these different rules
and traditions? Is that God's will? Is
it all the rules that the Mormons have
come up with that you got to follow?
That's God's will is to do X, Y, and Z.
Um, and again, that goes back to this
original point in my opinion is that
it's about having a personal
relationship with God because God's
spirit will tell you what his will is.
And you know, you you have in the in in
the scriptures, you have these
paradoxical teachings, right? You have
you have the Old Testament, which is
like go into the land of Canaan and kill
man, woman, and child. Wipe them out.
And then you have Jesus saying forgive
your enemies. And you know the the the
final step before reaching when he tells
us in the sermon on the mount to be
therefore perfect even as your father
which is in heaven is perfect. He
concludes this like calling out of us to
go level up. go be the best, most
powerful version of ourselves. We have
divinity inside of us. You know, we're
sons and daughters of God. Like, go be
perfect like your father which is in
heaven is perfect. Um, right before
that, Christ teaches this, you know,
what where you're kind, you know, you're
on that road to perfection is when you
can really learn to love your enemies
and wish good on those who who don't
wish you good. And that's like this step
of reaching this highest, you know, this
this level of of of perfection in this
life. And ultimately what Christ taught
and this is what I hang my hat on now is
you know when he was asked what are the
two great commandments of course he said
love God and love your neighbor and
that's really what it boils down to
everything else that's not leading to
that is a distraction is I don't believe
is of God I think it's of men anything
that's taking us away from being united
together as brothers and sisters
regardless of our religious cultural
economic whatever backgrounds whatever
is dividing us and keeping us separated
is in my opinion is not God's will
because God is saying we need to come
together and we need to love each other.
And the only way that we can love each
other is if we first love God. And God
is the truth. If you want to know what
God is, you know, we can we can say God
looks like this. We can describe
different characteristics of every
religion is going to have a different
projection of who God is. But ultimately
to me, what God is fundamentally is the
truth. Christ said, "I'm the way, the
truth, and the life. I'm the truth. I'm
teaching the truth. I'm trying to get
you to wake up to your divine nature.
wake up to this personal relationship
that you can have with God. Like come to
me and work out your salvation. I'll
work it out with you. Like he's teaching
profound truth. And that is you have to
you have to love the truth first before
you can effectively love everybody else.
But the problem is that idea of what is
the truth has been hijacked by the
religious to say no no no the truth is
not broad enough for everybody. It's
only for our little group of people. we
have the truth and everybody else out
there has to be wrong and it's our job
to go save them from themselves. And
it's just such a corrosive, divisive
uh framework that I think is so contrary
to everything that Jesus was trying to
teach in the gospel. He's trying to get
us to wake up and like think for
ourselves and go to God, work out your
salvation, and instead we do what humans
always do. We created a religion around
it and uh and then started trying to
control people and trying to pick
winners and losers. And it's just the
opposite everything I see Jesus
teaching.
>> John, he had a really good point when he
started off. He said, "What is the will
of God? How do you know?" This person
says, "This is the will of God. Do the
will of God." But how how do you come to
know what's the will of God?
>> Is that right, Adam? That was what you
opened with that question. How do we
know what the will of God is? And please
at any time, Adam, I feel comfortable if
you have any direct questions for for
John, please ask away or myself. Go
ahead, John.
>> Yeah. I mean in in in the Quran, God
refers to himself as the clear truth
that God is is the obvious apparent
truth that everything like all of his
all of his attributes. And of course
when we say his it's just because there
is no you can't call God it. And so you
know for us it would be blasphemy to
think that God is like male or female.
God is above and beyond anything of
creation. But everything in creation is
emanating the light of his truth. And so
we are those conscious beings, back to
your point, that have that special
connection with him that all the rest of
the beings are functioning in a default
mode. They just do his will as they were
created. That's why if you look at the
colonies of ants or bees, they support
each other's best interest without
question. They never default unless we
get involved. And that's the wrong that
is the that is the problem with us is
that we're not maintaining God's will.
So you know for me when we say what is
the truth um it's not about um me owning
something myself uh or me being part of
a group
um it's about I would say like I would
look at it from this perspective you
know how I deal with a lot of people
particularly the young crowd these days
that are very confused I say either
everything just popped up out of nowhere
and that is a very tall tale that takes
a leap of faith um to believe that
everything just popped up out of
nowhere. Um that's the atheist
contention um and then organized itself
in such a very amazingly uh systematic
beautiful way or God has been you know
creating and God is like detached. God
does not have a direct connection or if
we that's a problematic because we say
okay look out throughout history we have
that like for me as a Muslim I would say
probably Buddha was a prophet. Um, the
Quran talks about prophets being sent to
the corners of the earth. That was one
thing that resonated with me is I was
kind of struggling with why would God
only choose some people in the Middle
East region and the rest of humanity was
just like smart animals as some rabbis
put it. Um, but the Quran talks about
prophets being sent to all of the
corners of the earth and throughout
history, but that God had a special
covenant through the children of
Abraham. Um, because of the uniqueness
of Abraham. And I don't want to get on a
tangent because I could go very long
into Abraham um because that's really
the core of the identity of of of any
true believer is is what he represented.
But for me it's like okay does God have
a message? Um and so I would you know
cuz you know as you're you're a
researcher I would encourage uh you to
look into is it something that you can
prove the veracity of the claim. For me,
it is a mountain of evidence that the
finality of God's revelation came to
Prophet Muhammad. And that revelation
confirms all previous revelations and
then clarifies the the distortions and
confusion and sets a clarity that would
be useful for anybody at any time until
the day of judgment uh to be able to
recalibrate and get back if they've lo.
Um, so, um, for for me, you know, there
has to be a reference point. And when I
studied and compared all of the
different traditions, it became very
clear to me that this Quran revealed to
one prophet over 23 years and then
preserved quite miraculously re recently
in Birmingham, they found a copy uh that
was carbonated in the in the life of the
prophet peace and blessings be upon him.
There are others that were carbonated
within the century that he taught um in
Turkey and in Usbekiststan and Yemen and
Saudi Arabia. Um but this the copy that
they found in Birmingham, they said they
even they even put it like within the 50
years before his birth, which of course
would make no sense how you would have a
book that references a person who
doesn't exist as a prophet yet. Um but
you know for me that preserved scripture
that reference point that access there
is only one language that from any
scripture like that's another thing like
you know what Jesus spoke was Aramaic
that's pretty much a dead language. It's
in between Hebrew and Arabic. Um it
sounds a little bit more it looks and
sounds a little bit more Arabic than
Hebrew but it has you know that's a
sister tongue. um you'd have to you that
like when passion of the Christ Mel
Gibson explained that you know whenever
I was trying to look into certain things
I was looking at how some of the
Assyrians had translated some of the
ancient Greek texts to what is now the
the remnants of of Aramaic and then I
used Arabic scholars to help me to
translate that best to English. Um, and
then obviously, you know, you know,
Christ did not speak Greek, even though
the Cananan gospels are are are
preserved in in Greek. Uh, Hebrew was
pretty much a dead language for
centuries because of Hellenism. But with
the emergence of the modern state of
Israel, they knew that if they're going
to go colonize this place, they have to
look like they're really from it. And if
they're calling themselves the Hebrews,
they need to start speaking Hebrew. So
they kind of used Yiddish and you know
their kind of hodgepodge of European
languages uh in Arabic and uh what is
written in the in the ancient scriptures
to kind of come up with a new Hebrew but
that Hebrew would ne definitely not be
what what Moses spoke. Um, so yes,
anyways, I I would just say that the the
kind of my thought is is that
to just rely upon that very real
spiritual experience we all have is
dangerous. And I believe I have the
answer to that from the evidence that I
have studied that um I know when my self
my my my physical egotistical
carnal desire self is wrong because I
can always go back to the scripture and
it's not something that like it's not
the Quran isn't something in the hadith
is not something like completely
different and separate and relative to
Arabs because you will find everything
that Christ spoke very vividly spoken.
Actually, I did a I don't want to go
onto a sermon here, but I did a
Thanksgiving service 3 years ago. And
because I'm from Oklahoma, when I grew
up, I I had friends that were still
pretty much thoroughly native um chalk
um natives. And I remember I got this uh
Native American proverb spiritual uh
sage book that is basically just a
collection of scriptural references that
they've translated to English. And I
found plenty of references that look
exactly like the Quran. So I did a test
on my people to show them in our
community. I gave a sermon. It was fully
leaning on. So I said the verse, but I
didn't say where I got it from. So at
the end I told them this whole sermon
was taken from Proverbs of the Native
Americans. So they were obviously at
some point God had sent them a message.
And because they didn't just come up
with this clarity on their own, there
were they they say that the men who
walked in the spirit in the in the path
of the great spirit that they brought
this to us. Um so that's something that
we all are can recognize when we see it.
Um so that's kind of the where where I
see is like you know the clarity of
knowing the the truth.
So yeah, John, I got a question for you
on that because it seems like um Islam
or Muslims have kind of the same issue
that Christians have where they have
different sects within the greater
religion that that disagree with each
other, right? So they'll have like the
Shiites or the Sunnis. I'm just I don't
I don't have a deep knowledge of this
and so I'm kind of in, you know, I'm I'm
just kind of dipping my toes in this a
little bit, but it seems like it's kind
of the same issue where you have
different people saying this is how the
scripture is supposed to be interpreted.
This is who's in charge. This is who you
got to listen to within kind of every
major religion. You have these these
groups that make up that religion that
seem to argue and disagree with each
other.
>> Actually, I would say we don't have that
problem. Um so when we look at the
prophet peace and blessings be upon him
when he passed away um he adamantly told
people that I am leaving you the
scripture I'm leaving you the way it's
the whole book was revealed and
preserved and everybody has memorized it
uh those handful of literate people had
written it down so dozens of them um and
so he made that point and he also
emphasized those people in my family um
his wives his you know children
grandchildren
um cousins and uncles that were still
there. He said these people were closest
to me. So what Shiat is in essence the
literally the word means faction and
where the term actually was coined is in
the time of man about 30 years after the
prophet peace and blessings be upon him
uh 20 some odd years um it's a kind of a
long story but I'll try to summarize it
for you that he was more of kind of like
a monkish type even though he was the
ruler Omar before him was a much more
politically studious and very conscious
of the importance of dealing with all of
the different provinces. Man was like
praying in the night all night, fasting
throughout the day, uh reading
scripture. He didn't travel much. So he
allowed his family members extended who
claimed to be pious and claimed to be
serious to you know kind of put
governance together. So there was a lot
of complaints coming from that and some
people were taking from the family and
his extended family the prophet saying
you know these people are closer to the
your family comes from the those who
originally opposed the prophet and so
you know the family of the prophet is
close so they kind of invented this idea
that the family of the prophet are
holier and that they have like some sort
of actual spiritual empowerment so
that's kind of when there was a debate
after uh Ali became the ruler and Muawia
who was who was the cousin of of man. Um
there was a debate about who would be
having the official authority because
all of the armies, the Byzantines, the
the Persians are still kind of you know
there in some minor degree. So in that
process there was clearly a group that
said we're with Ali because he is the
sonin-law of the prophet peace and
blessings be upon him. And that they
called them Shiat Ali, the followers of
the son-in-law of the prophet. And they
said Muawia is not related to the
prophet. And so he he's far from the the
lands where he's in Syria. So that's a
far. So they started to say these guys
are you know using this kind of ancient
tribalized thinking which unfortunately
they had uh kind of in moved in that
direction and they they ended up going
in that direction kind of as a political
authority. uh thereafter. So the Shiites
over time they started at first it was a
political thing that then turned into
some of these rulers then started to
really clamp down on the family of the
prophets. Anytime they said anything
they would come and sometimes murder
somebody just to maintain their
authority which of course is completely
against Islam in every way shape or
form. Um so they started to develop
beliefs that the family of the prophet
there's like this inherited legacy like
Abraham, Isaac, uh um uh Jacob and you
know like that kind of thinking Joseph
that there's this holy so Shiites slowly
over centuries became this kind of new
thing that okay we have the prophet and
what he taught and everybody's in
agreement. Nobody ever doubted the
Quran. You don't find any Shiite telling
you I don't believe the Quran is the
same Quran. Um but really all that was
added or was kind of changed or confused
is they started saying whatever these
family members of the prophet to your
point they should be you know taken as
the like almost revelation I guess they
say like it's revelation but all the all
the mainstream Muslims denied this and
actually there's an interesting point
where there's very clear historical
references from people who were the
family of the prophet that rejected this
and called it blasphemy to say that my
words so for Jaff his dad Muhammad Bakar
who are the great great grandchildren of
the prophet they said I'm just a person
of knowledge and I've been blessed to be
from the family of the prophet but
whoever is saying I have some holy this
is not true and so when you ask Shiites
how do you deal with that they say well
they don't want to create division so
they say this just to you know hide the
truth to themselves and and and time so
now what they believe is with Kmeni in
Iran just to kind of see where we're at
that one day there will be this Mai who
will come and he supposedly he's you
know living for hundreds of years. So
that group has amounted to be about 12%
of Muslims, the Iran area, Bahrain,
Iran, Iraq, you know, that that area has
that there. And it really wouldn't have
come to so much, but back you know, in
the end of the Ottoman Empire, as they
started to lose their way, um this guy
came out and he has an interesting
story, Ismael, um that kind of made this
huge resurgence of being Shiite. Um but
yeah, so 88% of all Muslims, some 1 six
billion, 8 billion, whatever all over
the world, we're all in agreement that
there is the scripture and there is
scholars. So I always tell people when
people come in and start challenging
things, they say, you know, well, you
know, liberalism gives people the
freedom. I say, within Islam, we have as
much as we need. like there's scholarly
interpretations about many things and
you're free to choose. those that tried
to claim that you need to stick to one
scholarly school of thought or one um
imam or whatever that doesn't have it
that's baseless actually it contradicts
the Quran says
ask people of knowledge if you don't
know or study the scriptures if you
don't know that's the way the Quran
tells the average common believer
actually the whole Quran is there is no
reference of allowing there to be some
sort of class in the
Did he answer your question, Adam?
>> Uh, I I think so. I mean, I I I think my
point still is that um anytime you have
humans involved in the process, it's
going to get there's going to be
disagreements. There's going to be
imperfections. There's going to be um
agendas and how things are interpreted.
And I think um you're you're kind of
describing that unfold. Maybe it's more.
I again I don't have a deep uh intimate
knowledge of of any of the history of
Islam. Um in Christianity, we just it's
super fractious. We have a million
different denominations. You know, you
got the Baptists, you got the Borns, you
got the Methodists, you got the
Lutherans, you've got Mormons, you got
Catholics. She could go down with all of
them having different styles, different
interpretations
and and different um systems to follow
in order to be saved that you have to
follow through some sort of process to
to get some some form of salvation. And
I think, you know, just where I'm at as
I study Christ that Jesus was trying to
liberate us from all of that. And I I
believe that of there are inspired
prophets. I I agree with what you said,
John. I think Buddha was probably a
prophet. Like I think he anybody who's
teaching truth is in that sense to me
that's what a prophet is is somebody who
places the truth, their pursuit of the
truth and then their understanding of
sharing the truth with others as kind of
the role of being a prophet is somebody
who teaches the truth. And I think you
have those in all different cultures.
And I think God meets all of his
children right where they're at. you
know, wherever whatever cultural
framework or lens they have, God is
going to speak to them in their own way
of understanding to teach truth. I I
agree with that. I think Muhammad was uh
a prophet. I think there's been
Christian prophets. I think there's been
prophets all over the world. And I I
happen to believe that Christ was um
teaching us all to be prophets, all of
us to place the truth above our own
interests, to place the truth above
fitting in. um or being accepted and
that all of us are entitled to
revelation that God is no respector of
persons that if we will if we will show
up if we will pursue the truth with an
honest heart uh and accept it whatever
it is it'll and and the truth is hard to
accept I mean if it doesn't challenge
you if it doesn't stretch you it's not
the truth right like it's got to be
something that like because none of us
have arrived none of us are there and so
anything that is really genuinely true
should be something of a gut check for
every single one of us. But I believe
that God, just like he speaks to all
different cultures in ways that they can
understand, he meets them right where
they're at. I think he does that with
all of us individually. Like he meets us
right where we're at. And I I hate using
the term my truth because it sounds like
somebody's drinking their own Kool-Aid,
but I do think like I have five
children.
Um
I don't I don't have favorite kids.
There's not kids that I'm like, "Hey,
you're my special kid. Go teach the
other kids. I'm going to kind of whisper
in your ear and then you go tell the
other kids what I told you." And if they
don't accept you, they're they're I
don't I don't have grace for them
anymore. Like that doesn't make any
sense. But that's what at least modern
Christianity has come up with is that
sort of framework. Um I meet all of my
kids at where they're at. They're at
different ages. They're at different
perspectives and understandings. uh and
there's a different strategy that works
with them in terms of helping them to
learn and grow and and giving them
structure and consequences. It's very
different. I I approach all of them
within the same family from the same
imperfect person. There's a kind of a
different relationship and a different
strategy that I have with every single
one of my kids. And I think that that
framework which I can observe and see
that's how I understand God's
relationship with us is that he meets us
right where we're at and that he's he's
going to speak to us what we need to
hear at this time. You know the
scriptures whether it's the Quran or
whether it's the Bible or even the Book
of Mormon what the Mormons claim it to
be a historical record of the people in
in North America. um
those those scriptures uh I believe are
inspired but they were written at a
specific time to a specific group of
people. That doesn't mean that we can't
pull inspiration from it and have a
foundation from it today. But if God
spoke to those people at that time, wh
why wouldn't he speak equally as much to
us at our time? And why couldn't I
receive just as much revelation as
another one of God's children if I'm
willing to
pay the price for that? Which means
sacrificing my ego, sacrificing my own
will, you know, being humble and willing
to take correction. Like if I and and to
be fully invested and honest in pursuit
of God and the divine and the truth, I
believe God speaks to all of his
children who are willing to to pay that
price. like he's going to he's going to
he's going to send us all inspiration in
our own way, our own scriptures on how
to understand him and our relationship
with him.
>> John, did you want to go ahead and
comment on that?
Yeah. I mean, this is the fundamental
truth of Islam is that the prophets are
the only way we could know how to walk
in God's path, the straight path. That
prophets, that's why for each prophet,
like I've talked to like some of my
friends who say, "But how do you
reconcile? I am the way and the truth
and the life. No one should go to the
father except through me." As a Muslim,
we have no problem with that because
what Christ or any other prophet was
saying is I have been sent to give you
the example and to explain to you the
proper understanding of God and his will
and how to live it out. So that is the
the truth and then if you live according
to that way and that truth that I have
shown you, that's how you'll gain
everlasting life. Um and so that's uh
it's like similarly with the beginning
of John, you know, like the word was God
and the word was with God and the word
became flesh. For us, God is simply
telling Mary to be pregnant. And so his
word is that things become because he
wills it. And so that that will became.
So then also we receiving the
revelation, we are supposed to bring
God's word to the world by doing what he
taught to the prophets. So yeah, so um
you know, we we understand that Prophet
Muhammad came to conclude that message
and to affirm and give the this the
framework. There's something that we
have in our tradition. It's called
um the the derivation methodology um
that I guess I would say is very clearly
proved that the Quran is not just some
specific because there are things that
are very much were rel relative to Arabs
in the world of that of that time. Um
but under underlying I'll give you one
example of this. So one of the most
prominent scholars of Islamic history is
Iben Tamia. He lived in Syria um in the
700s uh of of common era uh not common
era of Hijra. So that would have been in
the 1300s. Um so in his time the Syria
and the kind of that area they had been
pretty much occupied by the Mongols by
that time. Um, but he was asked if
there's a woman who has this, you know,
business and she's someone who has a
very successful business and I get into
a business deal with her and then we
have a dispute. The Quranic verse said
that if there's a contract between men
and you cannot find two uh trustworthy
male witnesses, you should bring one
male and two female witnesses so that
the other female would remind um the
other female. Soia
was asked um what if I have this
contract here with this woman who is a
business woman. He said in that case I
would rely upon her more than these
carpenters or blacksmiths or anything
because the reason why God said that was
not because women are somehow deficient
in their witness. It's because for the
vast majority of human history women do
not run businesses and do business deals
and that's not what they're accustomed
to in their daily life. So they would
have a handicap by general standard of
behavior. Um and if God was to explain
every single point in his final
scripture like that, it would be many
volumes and nobody could memorize it.
It'd be very hard to keep it in. So he
jam-packs these things to where you can
look into the underlying point of that
of that legislation and see what was the
purpose of it. So he said, I would just
I if she's known to be a woman of
business, I would take her witness as
sufficient. And so I don't see any
reason. So interestingly enough, you
know, like it's interesting, you know,
like Saudi Arabia is kind of going
through some strange modern changes
based upon the the economic interests of
the country, which is unfortunate. Um
and so uh they rely on him and and they
say even is like the conservative. But
when you look at a lot of what he said
um on many issues um you know for
example women traveling that was another
thing that the prophet Muhammad said a
woman should not travel uh any long
distance without a male to be there with
her and so uh he was asked well nowadays
we have all of these routes we have uh
people who are you know patrolling that
didn't exist back then he said exactly
the prophet Muhammad knew back then in
Arabia that there are hijackers there
are people in the desert. Strange people
who back throughout his life, much of
his life until the last couple years,
there was no actual governance system
that ensures safety and laws. And it was
kind of like a tribal anarchy. And so
she's in danger unless there's a man
there to protect her. So he said in the
modern day, if you know that she's going
to be safe, then it's fine. So, one of
the scholars that I learned from here uh
in the states um he once told me there's
certain places in inner city where if a
woman went down the street, she's in
danger. Um so, she should probably have
a man to look after and make sure that
she doesn't get accosted or something
like that. Whereas to drive her to the
airport for her to fly across the world,
she's perfectly safe. So, there's no
reason for a man to be with her. The
whole entire journey will be taken care
of. So the ruling isn't meant to be
literal. It has a purpose behind it. So
we have that for all of the entire
teachings of the Quran and Sunnah. And
so then we have a broad interpretive.
Like when people bring up Sharia law,
it's like for all of us Muslims, we're
like, "You guys don't know what you're
talking about." Like there's infinite
knowledge of the interpretive legacy
that's relative to different times and
places all over planet earth in which
Muslim scholars were prioritizing what
you know like right now the issue of
phones and social media and certain
things about preserving intellect and
preserving creative thought and critical
thinking that are in the scripture. So
are these things that we should now
create some laws and rules to protect
the next generation looking at AI where
now people are moving. So there's things
written in the scripture that now we're
we're using those principles why it was
prohibiting alcohol and and mindaltering
drugs um because it takes your capacity
to make good decisions um away from you.
So this is kind of how we would say that
we don't have a problem of you know kind
of time specific uh scriptural um
referencing.
>> We're almost out of time. I want to kind
of jam these question questions in a few
more that I have and Adam I'll let you
also ask any any questions that you
have. I I want to go back to the where
we open up the program with with Adam
brilliantly just breaking down some of
these facts uh about the Bible and what
we believe about the Bible. Obviously,
there is the word of God in there. There
is the word of God in there. There's the
word of prophets in there. There's the
words of historians in there. There is
the words of anonymous authors. We don't
know who they are. And it's all put
together. So now there's things in the
Bible that we would say for example uh
where Jesus says when he's asked what's
the greatest commandment you mentioned
uh you know to love your neighbor love
God with all your heart your neighbor.
The other one that here O Israel the
Lord that God is one. We'd say this is
the word of God. This is it. Then
there's things in there for instance
that we would say are slanders against
the mighty prophets of God. For
instance, Lot with his daughters,
Bashibba with David. We would say no,
these things are fabrications against
that the what the some of the most
noblest men to walk the earth. So now um
coming to my question, how do you for
somebody like Adam John who sees all of
this happening? Most people are going to
kind of think like this is the same
thing's probably happening with other
books. And then you look at the Quran.
How do we how can someone know that this
Quran wasn't compiled like the Bible?
It's been filtered through man's hands.
And I I really found pro because here's
the reality is that either the Quran is
from the devil, the Quran is from
Prophet Muhammad. These uh if you uh
either from a group of men or it's from
God. So if we exclude all of these
things from the devil from prophet
Muhammad himself or a group of people
what other option could it be? And then
uh it's interesting there's a
styometrics test along with the other
proofs that we know that are in their
prophecies authenticity memorization
preservation and things that there's
just no way fathom that a human being
could know these things. But I thought
this was interesting to eliminate the
first two is the styometrics text that
was done. And I don't know if you know
about it John is that they looked at and
this is the way to distinguish if
somebody's writing u Shakespeare or it's
not. They they do patterns in the
writings and they determined through
this test that there's only one author
in the Quran and it's not prophet
Muhammad because they also looked at his
words is from the hadith from Sahil
Bkadi what they looked at it. So then
you're like, okay, who's it from then,
John? Who is this book from? And how can
how can you convince somebody like Adam
or anyone listening? You say, "Oh, it's
the word of God." Yeah, so does the
Bible say it's the word of God. But hold
on. We just had Adam opened it up and
just give all these evidences and proofs
and anybody can go down that path and
see. But how can someone be sure that
the Quran is actually from not Muhammad,
a group of men, the devil, but actually
from the creator of the heavens and
earth?
I mean, I would just summarize by saying
that there's a whole litany of very
clear evidences that there's no way I
mean again, you know, either Prophet
Muhammad is is coming up with this on
his own, which is impossible. How would
he know all these details when he
doesn't even read and write Arabic, much
less does he know Greek or Hebrew? He's
never been around people speaking Greek
or Hebrew. So whatever loose scriptures
at that time there was not a working
Bible in circulation
um in the in 700 640 uh common era um
especially according to Christian Arabs
the first Arabic translation of the
Bible was in the 900s 300 years after
prophet Muhammad so he had no access to
really know all these details um so
that's that's one major issue the sty
styometrics point where they uploaded
into the internet and even you know
basically in the first parts of AI in
the in the 20 late 2010s they they asked
about you know who is the one authoring
what. So they found that the language
the style the different usage of phrases
that this is not the same author as
that. Um you know you look at a litany
of things like when in the Quran God
talks about he made the earth he he
lifted the sky and made it a protective
ceiling above you you know like ozone
layers and atmosphere like there's a
number of these type of things like in
the beginning all of creation of the
heavens and the earth were one entity
and then we split them you know that the
we are expanding the universe God says
in the royal we u so there's a number of
those type of things scientific facts
that are there but the kind of his
impact on people and how a whole entire
society was transformed within 23 years.
Um, completely like 180. I I don't know
of any other time in human history. So,
there's just all these things that we
would say that to say either he was a
liar and he learned it from somebody,
but then who did he learn it from? And
then to say that
is absurd to say the devil because the
devil his whole thing is follow your
selfish desire. Like that is the
devilish way to be absorbed with self
and to exclude the welfare of others for
your own personal benefit. Arrogant,
greedy, selfabsorption.
The world is now very satanic. I mean
it's the system of of governance that we
have in the world is very materialistic,
very self-individualistic.
Um and so the Quran is very much against
that. the Quran time and again it begins
every chapter in the name of God the
benevolent the beneficent merciful
compassionate serving the needs of
others is a fundamental point of being a
servant of God to reject yourself to
reject what is evil which is to cause
harm to others um and good which is to
bring benefit to the world around you um
so the these things I mean you know
these three elements for us that's where
we get our foundations as believers is
that who he was how he lived, how people
who knew him um reacted, what they knew
about him. Nobody ever challenged that
he in his life like his people who
followed him, they didn't ever say, "Oh
well, he learned this from somebody else
or he was literate." The Quran says he
was illiterate three times. I mean,
there's 90 some odd 5% of society was.
Um, so these are the kind of the
foundations why we we stick with the
Quran and that's what we would say we
can recognize from the Bible um and from
other scriptures what what the word of
God is because we use that as our our
default.
Uh Adam, when you hear nowadays you hear
this um and have you noticed there's
been a ramp a hate up a turnup in the
algorithm. Have you noticed now we have
but what are your thoughts? have this um
increasing hate that's been spread, you
know, towards Muslims, towards Islam.
Have you have you been noticing it and
in uh your community on online and I see
that you have been open-minded enough to
read the Quran? You've traveled. That
makes a huge difference. Many people
they're in their town, their little
village, right? And now they haven't got
to explore and you and I think this does
a real disservice for humanity because
now people are scared of the unknown.
And now this is Muslims are being
painted as they're going to take over
America even though they're like what is
it 1%. What are your thoughts when you
hear all are you hearing all of this?
And that's why I commend someone like
you who is brave enough to come out and
have a conversation.
>> Yeah, I think that's a great question. I
think uh I I think it goes in all
different directions. I see um not in my
personal proximity. This is all in the
stuff that we see in the algorithm or on
the news. Um, I don't know anybody
personally that is anti-Muslim.
>> Uh, at least that I'm aware of. I don't
have anybody that's like saying
derogatory things about Muslims or
anything. Um, so again, that's just my
circle. But I do see in the news cycle,
in this narrative that's going on in
these algorithms, a lot of hate for
Muslims, a lot of hate for Christians, a
lot of hate for Jews. Um, the Jews are
taking over the world. Jews are the bad
guys. Jews are evil, blah blah blah.
Muslims are evil. They're bad. Look at
them. They're blowing up building
suicide bomb. Blah blah blah. Jews are
responsible for the, you know,
pornography. Christians are
self-righteous and casting stones at
everybody and whatever else. And I see I
see a lot of negativity just going
around. And I think
um
I think some of that's natural uh human
nature. Um, I think Christ religion
throws the first bomb, so to speak, or
the first punch by saying, "We know God
and the rest of you don't is essentially
kind of what every religion to some
degree or another claims." And I think
that is inclined to make people feel
defensive and to immediately create
antagonists to something like that if
you go around and tell everybody they're
not being saved because they don't think
and talk like you. and and particularly
when I think religion in general is an
easy target um to to pick apart for a
number of different reasons. And I I
pose this to you, John, with with all
due respect. I'm playing something of
the devil's advocate a little bit here
because again, I've read the Quran. I
found it inspiring. Um it's been a long
time. This conversation is going to make
me want to read it again. So, I've got
to brush brush back up on it. But I
remember my first impression of it was
just this is enlightening. I really en
enjoyed my time in it. And uh I wasn't
reading it from a believer's point of
view. So obviously I was going to get
something different out of it. Um but I
was inspired by it. I thought there's
truth here. And Muhammad had to have
been a prophet in my mind. You know,
somebody who was inspired to share
things with us. So I what I say now I
say with due all due respect to that.
You were saying that um the devil again
I'm playing the devil's advocate. So,
uh, you were saying that the devil, we
know what the devil's will is, is for us
to lean into our natural inclinations,
into our lust, into our, um, whatever
else. And I agree with you, and we're
seeing that rampantly around the world
right now. And anybody who's saying not
to do that is treated like something
like a social pariah. However, I also
think the devil's will is manipulation
and tyranny. And I think religion fits
into that where it tries to control the
way people think and tells them, sells
them something that may look good on the
surface, but underneath is actually
keeping them further and further away
from the truth. And I think religion by
and large does that in most of the
religious experiences, religious, not
spiritual experiences, not one-on-one
human experiences, but that there's kind
of this element of controlling the way
people think. Um, a tyrannical element
to religion that you have to think like
us. And you made a good point about and
I like that about how and I think it
applies to the Bible as well, at least
parts of the Bible, that you can take
these writings that were 2,000 years
ago, 1500 years ago, three, whatever
they are, you know, and you can say
those words and those principles,
especially when applied with a little
bit of rationality and logic to your
point about a woman traveling, we can
apply those same principles throughout
time. And I think that's an important
point. That's where I think really
profound truths are are couched in these
these ancient texts. However, the my
issue one of the big Achilles Hill for
religion from my perspective is that you
can't apply that backwards. So the the
claim that religion makes is that and
I'll I'll just speak from a Christian
point of view, but I think this applies
to to
Christians have to claim that God either
loves all of his children the same, in
which case they're living a
contradiction, or God has special kids
that he likes more than other kids, in
which case that doesn't sound like a God
that makes any sense to me. If we can if
we can tell anything about God, God
loves diversity. He's created diversity.
You know, all different perspectives. We
all have a very unique genetic coding
that's one of one. We all have very
unique perspectives growing up. We all
have different timelines, different, you
know, traumas, different experiences
that shape up a oneofone unique
perspective on this world. And then God
has created all these different cultures
and religions and people born all over
the world. And I think the latest dating
for human existence is something around
200,000 years old now that they're
uncovering, you know, remnants of human
civilizations or close to human
civilization that are that long ago. And
so for me, one of fundamentally what one
of the problems that I've had with
Christianity, the claims that it makes
is that this is the only true path to
God is Christianity. However,
Christianity hasn't been around that
long. It's and and when it has been
around, it's only been a fraction of a
fraction of a fraction of the percent of
the world's population that have ever
even heard of it. Now, of course, it's
more mainstream today. More far more
people have heard of Christianity. I
believe it's the largest uh religion in
the world right now. But for most of
human history, nobody had ever even
heard of Christianity or Jesus or even
the earlier stages of this small little
tribe of, you know, Hebrews that were
coming out of bondage and came down from
Abraham and went into the promised land.
a fraction of a fraction of a fraction
of the world's population was part of
that. And so if you if you think God
loves all of his children, so either he
has to love all of his children and then
that narrative is nonsense that you have
to be part of a specific lens or system
or belief to be saved because all of our
beliefs have not been around very long
according to human history. Only a small
percentage of us have been exposed to
it. And so you either have to claim that
um God has favorite kids that he gives a
special sauce to and everybody else is
kind of dismissed and their experiences
is second class at best like they don't
they don't have the truth and so they
can't really live a a meaningful
fulfilled life because they're not
following our particular system. Or you
have to say God loves all of his
children and he meets everybody right
where they're at. whether they lived
200,000 years ago, 100,000 years ago,
6,000 years ago, or whether they lived
at the time when Muhammad showed up or
when Christ showed up, that God is the
same today, yesterday, and forever. And
that he communicates with all of his
children. And I believe that more. And I
think it's an Achilles Hill for religion
because they have to make the claim that
whatever the religion is that we're the
truth. We've got the right answers. And
we have to disregard the fact that most
of God's creations have never been
exposed to that truth. And how do you
reconcile that?
>> Yeah. And I definitely agree that within
the history of the finality of
prophethood that came through Prophet
Muhammad peace and blessings be upon
him. I wouldn't. So that's one of the
things that's interesting is that the
way kind of history books and kind of
Wikipedia style knowledge of the of the
day that's very secular. We would say
Islam was something that was always
there. It's the way of God. All of
creation, the earth is spinning on its
axis around the sun. That's Islam. The
the the seed becomes a tree. That's
Islam. Um the bees go take the pollen
and make honey and that's Islam. Um so
for for us, you know, Prophet Muhammad
was the final messenger of Islam, not
the founder of the religion of Islam. We
would also actually say that the word
dean means the way, not a religion like
a set specific thing. So even though
there is within our tradition people who
tried to be very kind of controlling a
very specific way of thinking that
within the the mainstream of Islam has
always been rejected by a large body of
scholars the majority actually that you
know you're a unique person Adam most
people would stick with their kind of
kind of tribalized religiosity and be
like okay Muhammad is because really
with Muhammad you have either he's a
liar a madman or he was the messenger of
God Right. And so those are three
possible. There is no fourth. Right. So
um
>> well I would can I can I offer a fourth
possibility?
>> Yes.
>> Just a fourth one is that um that he was
a mixed bag like everybody else that he
had his moments of brilliance and he had
his moments of weakness. I'm not I'm not
saying this cuz I personally have
studied Muhammad. So I again I don't
want to say anything disparaging about
um about him at all. That's not my
intent to this. just as another option
is that what I think is generally the
case is that even the most inspired
people on the planet are deeply flawed.
That nobody is perfect and we all fall
short of the glory of God and and that
God's okay with that. Like that's part
of the plan, you know, like, hey, I've
created an imperfect world, a fallen
world, a world of entropy. Uh I've
placed very imperfect children creations
in this imperfect world. Uh and when
they have human experiences, I
understand it. I'm okay with it because
I've created this whole scenario. And I
just think for example, the woman caught
at the well, you know, in adulter
not at the well. Sorry, that's a
different woman. But the woman brought
to Christ in the temple when she's
caught in adultery. And they say, you
know, should we stone her? That's what
Moses would have told us to do. We
should stone her. This is the most
heinous of sins. And Christ of course
says, "He without sin cast the first
stone." And then uh they all walk away.
And he asks her, "Where are thine
accusers?" And she says, "There are
none, Lord." He says, "Neither do I
condemn thee, go and sin no more." And
so I I don't I don't know. I I I have a
problem in general with the idea of
piety and with people who consider
themselves holy because I think it's
like the it's like the other the parable
that Christ taught of the Pharisee and
the publican that are at the temple. And
the Pharisee gets up and says, "Oh,
thank you, God. I'm so blessed. I'm so
righteous. I have all these things. I'm
your favorite. I'm your chosen." Or
whatever he says. I'm paraphrasing. And
then you have the publican who's
despised by society, who's the Roman tax
collector, you know, the enemy of the
people. And he says, "God have mercy on
my soul." And Christ says, "That guy,
the the guy you hate, the guy you say is
the sinner, the publican, the guy
working for the enemy, that guy is the
one that's justified because he
recognizes his sin. He recognizes his
imperfections. He's not placing himself
in a in a level of like, I'm more
spiritual or I'm more holy or I'm more
pious or anything like that." And I
think that's where we start getting into
the corrosiveness of religion is when we
start to make this delineation between
even if people have studied a lot and
have a lot of great knowledge that
somehow that qualifies them to be a
better speaker on behalf of God where I
think every single one of God's
creations is unique, profoundly
important, and has just as much access
to God uh as anybody else. And God will
meet them right where they're at. Um,
and so again, this just goes back to my
problem fundamentally with the idea that
there's one religion that is the source.
I think brilliance comes from studying
all religions, gaining the insights and
the truth that are couched in all
religions because all religions are a
collective pursuit of people to go
towards the divine. As imperfect as it
is, that's essentially what religion or
at least when religion is healthy, it's
people coming together collectively
saying, "Let's pursue the best. Let's
pursue the ideal. Let's pursue the
divine." But quickly those religions are
you know choke that you know people in
power get power and maintain power and
then use religion to to increase their
power and influence and that's where
religion becomes really corrosive and
and contrary to to God's will.
So yeah, uh the the story of of uh Mary
um I read a commentary one time where I
said that what Christ was actually
indicating is probably some of you have
swept slept with this woman or someone
like her. And so before you start
stoning others, think about what you're
doing. And so that's where the whole
point of summarizing the law and to love
your neighbor as yourself is before you
know the the the plank in your eye you
know before you look at the other with
the with the splinter. Um so to go back
to the the point about prophet Muhammad
peace and blessings be upon him. We
understand that all prophets are the
model example and we do believe that
there was an attempt by powerful figures
throughout the history of the Jewish
community and it's even written in
Jeremiah that this is the lying pen of
scribes. Um that they penciled in what
we used to call like in dominoes, you
know, pen whipping. You know, the guy's
taking score somehow ends up winning.
It's like hold on. I I don't think you
got those points, man. Um, but you know,
I've talked to some pastors and some
rabbis and say, "How do you reconcile
that Lot was sent to a people who had
fundamentally corrupted the nature of
the family and the concept of sexual
desire?" And then he himself ends up
having incest with his two daughters.
Um, it just completely removes any logic
to God sending him or choosing him. Oh,
we all make mistakes. So now that opens
the door for all religious people and
people of religious authority to say,
"Oh, well, you know what? It's like some
of these stories about previous megaurch
pastors who, you know, fire and
brimstone about homosexuality, then they
get caught in some hotel room with
methamphetamine and a gay u man
prostitute." Um, so back to your point,
we would say just from what we know
about Prophet Muhammad peace and
blessings be upon him that he was the
best example as any other prophet was.
And even when people call when there was
a verse where God said that the truth
has come to you in a clear book and a
light from God, they started calling
Prophet Muhammad the light of God on
earth. And he said, "Guys, look, do not
exaggerate about me as those who came
before me exaggerated about Jesus. I'm
simply the servant and messenger of God,
but I am not God." Um, and when people
started to say that when his son died,
there was an eclipse, a solar eclipse on
the same day. And so people started
saying see God is upset because the
prophet's son has died. So he called
everybody in front of the um the mosque
and he said God created the sun and the
moon for specific purposes. It has
nothing to do with what happens with the
people on earth. So do not create
superstitious beliefs uh on your own. Um
so there's many examples like this where
he owns humility but you know when you
look at his example his character. So I
would I would say I would push back a
little bit by saying that there is not
one religion. We are all naturally
inclined to do the will of God. So we
would say the earth is filled with
Muslims. And I would say you're a Muslim
cuz what you've explained to me the
generality of the term Muslim is one who
seeks to do the will of God. The Quran
says to people who uh challenged the new
Muslims, go ask people of knowledge who
had previous scriptures and compare what
you're learning from this scripture and
then ask them, Jews and Christians, and
then you will see. Um, and so this point
of comparing and and and you know,
sharing knowledge and scripture and
experience is very much an Islamic thing
to to be in the will of God, to live in
the will of God, to walk in his path. So
we don't understand that everybody
before Muhammad, you know, or anyone who
does not know about him that they don't
know the truth. They're they're
naturally inclined to the truth. The
Quran says in multiple places, all of
humanity was guided to know that which
will preserve and uplift their their
soul um and that which will corrupt it.
So this kind of intrinsic
need of God and to pray to him and seek
his guidance. Even if you didn't have a
scripture, everybody has that. The Quran
is very firm about that. Every single
human being in history has had that. But
when you have a prophet and you have the
scripture, you have a very clear set
path with set guidelines that you can
get. Now when we say set guidelines
there is a broad body of interpretive
legacy and that was never meant to be
hierarchial nor territorial. There's so
we have that kind of broadness. I would
say it's it's the unique way of religion
within the religious traditions that we
would say whatever Adam so Adam and Eve
were told you can do whatever you want.
It's paradise but that tree don't go
near it. Don't eat from that tree. And
their curiosity is the humanity. So they
they got curious. They went over by
there and they both were wondering what
is this tree? So then Satan was there
and he's like no no no this tree is
going to make you immortal powerful
beings. And so they got enticed and they
ate. So what we understand is Adam and
Eve, you and I, our wives, we're all the
same. We would have ate from the tree.
We're all human. Um but then the
struggle of life is to seek out the
truth like you're doing and compare and
study scriptures and seek to to find the
truth and try to live by it. Um so
that's you know I I think what we would
say is when you when you find a prophet
the Quran talks about who goes to hell
as two categories. one who dis basically
disbelieves in God's existence, one who
would worship a statue instead of God
and give all their devotion to some
created being, some statue, or one who
rejects prophets when looking at all
their evidence and saying, "I don't
follow them. I don't like for us, if
somebody's in Abraham's time and they
said, you know what, Abraham, you're a
great guy. Interesting stuff. Cool
story, but I have God in my own. I don't
follow you. I don't believe you. I'm not
going to." He has rejected the way and
the truth and life. They have rejected
God through the messenger that was
clearly sent to give them the clarity.
So rejecting prophethood is uns. So
you're not doing that. But for someone
to just say, and this is a big
phenomenon like you very much touched
upon the tribalization of religiosity is
like Muhammad's not really. I don't
follow him. He's not a prophet. And they
really don't know anything about it. So
why would you say that without knowing?
Um so yeah I think it's important for
all of us to kind of keep on that
journey of seeking knowledge and you
know what I would say is the the the
kind of perspective that you have the
more you would look into prophet
Muhammad the more you would feel the
same thing you you have about Christ um
you would you would find that there's a
very the same thing it's the same exact
source and that one is a reliable uh you
know source of of reference and that one
is not trustworthy in terms of the whole
entire biblical I mean you're talking
about thousands of years of prophets and
so many different you know traditions
and trying to put it together into one
it just by the the the sheer reality of
trying to put that book together even if
everybody was very honest and sincere
and pious throughout the whole process
it would have be very difficult
endeavor. So having a final messenger
with with one um scripture and then all
all of these you know traditions that he
expounded upon it um makes it easy for
us to go back and be able to say okay if
I'm confused you know like if I'm not
sure about the morality of this um so
like for example you know there's script
scriptures in the Bible you know that
would indicate well you can drink some
but don't get drunken but I know from my
history and I know from my family's
history and from many people's history
alcohol Alcohol ruins whole people like
your life, your family. It's it's it's a
very destructive thing. So to to open it
up for personal feeling, there's
millions of Alcoholics Anonymous people
who would say, "If only I was told to
completely stay away from it, that it's
evil from the get-go. There was nothing
to gain from it."
>> Well, let can I jump in on that real
quick? Sorry. I just want to reply to
that point because I think this is an
interesting again it goes back to this
whole idea of what is the will of God?
Uh, is it the will of God for everybody
to not drink alcohol? Is is alcohol
innately evil? Um, I was raised that way
as a Mormon. You don't drink alcohol at
all? And I hadn't I didn't drink
alcohol. I had a little rebellious spurt
in high school for about 3 months where
I drank alcohol and then didn't until I
was about 40. And uh I was actually
having a wrestle with this in regards to
my theology that I've been raised in.
Um, I'm told if you drink alcohol,
you're sinning. And that alcohol is
intrinsically bad. I had a hard time
with that because I looked around and I
see yes, alcohol has ruined people's
lives. Um, so is sex, so is video games.
So has food. So you mean, you can go
down anything that's overindulged in and
there's going to be a portion of the
population or the people that will
overindulge and it will be destructive
to them. The majority of people that I
see that drink do it socially and it's
it's innocuous. It doesn't it doesn't
hurt them. And but I've been raised that
you're not going to heaven if you drink
alcohol. Like you don't not making it
back to God. And I'm trying to I'm
trying to wrestle with this because
Jesus's first miracle was to turn water
into wine at a party. And not only turn
water into wine, he made him like the
best wine they ever had. He's like,
"Here's the best stuff. I'm going to
make you you guys are this is the time
to make Mary. this is how I interpret
Jesus doing this. You know, I'm going to
turn this water into wine at a at a at a
celebration. And uh so I really was
struggling with that because I'm like on
one hand I'm reading Jesus turning water
into wine. I can observe around me that
most people that I see drink aren't
ruining their lives, but I've seen some
who have for sure. And it's uh something
you have to be cautious about just like
anything like is it going to control you
or are you strong enough to be able to
manage it? Whatever it is, fill in the
blank. It could be alcohol or anything
else. And uh you know, I had this
experience um with my wife uh down at a
a resort and I decided I was talking to
God. I said, "God, I want to I'm going
to I'm going to drink tomorrow and I'm
not drinking because I'm tempted by it.
I don't have any I don't even like
alcohol today, but I'm having this kind
of spiritual crossroads of do I continue
to double down in the religion that I've
been raised in the control and the then
in a very literal sense like tyrannical
way of thinking. you have to outsource
your critical thinking to the hierarchy
within the church. They're going to give
you all these rules you have to follow
if you don't follow these rules. You're
off the straight and narrow and you're
into, you know, hell or wherever you're
going at that point. So, I'm wrestling
with this and I decided, hey, I'm going
to drink God. And I'm and and then I'm
going to ask you if what I did was a
sin, if it was horrible or if I did
something bad. So, the next day I I
drank with my wife. We had a great day.
We didn't have any kids. We didn't have
any responsibilities. We didn't do
anything stupid. We didn't make any
mistakes. We were very responsible about
it. The next morning, I wake up at 4:30
in the morning, 5 in the morning, and I
go down to the beach and I pray and it's
just me on the beach and I asked God, I
said, "God, did I do something wrong
here?" You know, and I and I actually
thought at the time that I was going to
get reprimanded. I thought I would get
like God was like, "Son, you shouldn't
do that." You know, something like that.
I I didn't know what to expect except I
thought it was probably going to be some
sort of, "Yeah, this wasn't the right
thing for you to do." Because that's how
I've been raised my whole life to
believe. And instead, it was one of the
most profound spiritual experiences of
my entire life. It was just me and God
on the beach talking to him. And God was
just the the amount of love that I felt.
It it it's the top three most powerful
spiritual experiences I've ever had. I
just felt this outpouring of love from
God. And God was saying to me, "Son, you
didn't do anything wrong. You didn't go
beat your wife. You didn't go become an
alcoholic. you didn't go, you know,
abuse somebody or steal somebody or act
like an idiot and a slob and, you know,
I didn't, you didn't do any of that.
You're fine. You had a human experience
and that I'm okay with that. And that
was this huge catalyst shift for me out
of my orthodox way of thinking that
became kind of a domino effect for so
much further down the road where I'm at
now in this direction, which is to go
directly to God. And that God could tell
one of us, "Don't drink." He could say,
he could have told me, "Don't drink
because I have alcoholism in my family."
And God's like, "You shouldn't do this,
son, because this is going to ruin your
life." But he could say very much to
another one of his children, "This isn't
going to ruin your life. You didn't do
anything wrong." I don't think anything
is actually intrinsically good or bad.
It's all about the meaning that we
assign to whatever that is. Um, and if
it becomes something that is controls
us, if it's something we can't manage
and it manages us, that's a form of
tyranny and enslavement. And that's part
of God, Satan's plan, the devil's plan.
That's what I would believe, you know,
is that anything that we can't control
that controls us is influence from from
something else. God is trying to elevate
us into a state of freedom of
enlightenment and open us open our minds
and and that's going to be different for
everybody because we're all different
and that's on an individual level, but
that's where I'm I'm not arrived
anywhere. I'm I'm in this journey of
searching and I'm not trying to be
overly skeptical but of anything because
I want to be open to everything. But at
what where it brings me again to
religion where there's people that are
saying these are all the rules you need
to follow. If you don't follow these
rules, you're not following God's will.
And I just had a really one of the most
important spiritual experiences which
changed the direction of my spiritual
life and best I can describe it as being
for the better. I feel way more closer
to God. I way feel way more connected to
people now, less judgmental. I feel like
so much of my life has gotten better as
I've broken out of the religious control
that I was raised in. Um, and that was
that was this catalyst experience was
was drinking alcohol one day down in in
Mexico. And I don't I rarely drink
alcohol today. If I do, it's
occasionally and I drink some wine
occasionally here and there and I don't
feel like it's something that is
contrary to God's will.
>> Imam, if you want to go ahead and answer
this one, then we can wrap it up. We
went over the time, but I think this is
a fabulous conversation we're having.
So, it's um
>> yeah, I mean, you know, there are many
people who drink socially and there's no
problem. And I can get where you're
coming from. I mean, I've studied Joseph
Smith and and I'm familiar with the, you
know, kind of his history and the
history of the movement. It's amazingly
profound what happened in Utah. Like, I
mean, that's that's a human feat to many
never could imagine to achieve as a
group of people. Um, and I I have
friends and I've worked in interfaith
groups with a lot of people from the
Latter-day Saint community. Um, but I do
know that there's like a very rigid
control thing. I would say within the
Muslim community, we have elements of
that, but it's not like mainstream in
terms of like nitpicky control over
everything that you do. Um, when when I
when I speak about alcohol, I do speak
from experience and I do know many
people who were not Muslim and people
who were Muslim that felt like you felt.
So, I've met people who were born and
raised Muslim who thought like you
thought and they were their life was
ruined and they ended up in jail and
their life was completely because they
felt well Islam had this rule that I
shouldn't drink and then I started
drinking with a friend in college and
then drank a little bit. So, that's
that's the slippery slope. I mean, back
to your point and this is just something
to marinate on for all of us. I would
say that, you know, when you talk about
sex, okay, you can only have this
relationship with your wife, right? Um,
and not outside of that. So there's
always a structure and a system in play
in Islam. Um, and how do you avoid that?
So not being alone like the the the
prophet Muhammad said, don't be alone
with someone of the opposition. So, like
I don't know if you remember the Me Too
movement um back in the it was like 2015
2016 when a lot of women started to come
out and say after Hyri Weinstein and all
of his episodes with with aspiring
actresses and so forth that women all
over the world were saying, "Yeah, I
felt like the only way to come up was to
capitulate to sexual desires of a boss
or something like that." So, we had a
brother in our community who's a local
executive with the Bank of America and
he said, "I just came out of a meeting
and I told him, "You guys are going
Sharia law here." Like they're saying
there should be no alone. You can't, you
know, men should not be asking personal
questions about women, commenting on
their looks, should be no physical
contact. These are all things the
prophet Muhammad literally said do not
do it because it will be it's a these
are the footsteps of the devil. They
they open the door um to the wrong
thing. Everybody all terrible things and
terrible people start with some good
intentions. I mean I would say you know
I try to tell people people say Trump
this and that. I think Trump genuinely
believes he's a great guy and serving
the best interest of the world, right?
No matter what it is that he's doing.
Um, and I think many people who've done
terrible things, they believe about
themselves. So, that's where I think
having that like submission through
God's revelation is um is is a very
important point for me to stay on the
straight path. Otherwise, you know, I'm
I'm not sure where I'd be today. But
that's my own personal experience.
>> Adam, thank you so much. When you were
speaking earlier, I went back to this
verse from the verbatim word of God, the
Quran, where God Almighty is saying, "Oh
mankind, I created you from a single
male and a female. And I made you into
nations and tribes so that you may know
one another. Indeed, the most honorable
of you in the sight of God is are the
most righteous of you." Uh, so this is
something that I think correlates like
to me, you were almost like repeating
this verse about getting to know one
another. you know, n you know, all of us
with our different diversities,
languages, colors, and this is actually
mentioned in uh the Quran. It's amazing.
I hope we can do this again. I really
enjoyed um having you too on the
program. Thank you both.
>> Appreciate your time. Pleasure.
>> And I hope
>> really enlightening. I enjoyed the
conversation immensely.
>> I hope uh I hope uh people can take from
this and they can see how we can come
together and we can talk, we can reason
with each other and have good fruitful
conversations.
We thanks for hosting this.
>> You're welcome. Thank you both.
>> Where can people find you? Um
>> uh John and also Adam.
>> Well uh we have uh Pillars Mosque.org
um here in Charlotte, North Carolina
where I'm at. Um we have a YouTube
channel called Pillars Mosque Media. Um,
so we have a whole lot of things I think
that a lot of people that are listening
to this type of discussion that would be
relative to sharing different spiritual
experiences and understanding the
priorities of of us as a society. I
think that's what we try to focus on.
>> And Adam,
>> uh, Adam all red official on pretty much
all the social media platforms. That's
for sure.
>> Some of these insights. Thanks.
>> Thank you guys.
>> Definitely follow you.
>> Peace. Thank you. Islamic.