Ro
tolam it was a dream but now
alhamdulillah it's a
real my name is brother Omar abdah
AKA I'm from outside of Philadelphia and
I've been Muslim now for a period of 5
years
alhamdulillah where I'm from is a small
neighborhood outside of Philadelphia um
and when I go back to my uh we look back
at my history I had two households
basically in a house a household that
was very Christian oriented um we went
to church every Sunday um you hear
gospel music playing in the home every
Sunday and you don't you didn't find
anything secular pretty much going on in
the home in that in that
house where my mother was living this
was another
house total opposite um my mother was
Christian of course but she wasn't as
religious I went to church but there
were also things going on in the home
that of course uh Christians don't
normally do on that side you know my
mother was listening to Bob Marley uh
Stevie
Wonder Marvin Gay all of these different
things in the home so this is the this
is where the birth when my birth of
singing
began um as well
as being inspired by my father who would
come to visit at my mother's home being
inspired by hearing his voice my early
days also included me playing football
playing sports and trying to stay out of
the streets because in that environment
was
very that environment was an environment
that you can get caught up very easy
it's so my my mom wanted to keep me out
of the street so I started to play
sports very early that's that's pretty
much what my early life was about trying
to stay out of the streets playing
football and singing there was a point I
would say around this was high school
time and I had a choice whether I wanted
to continue playing football or was I
going to pursue a career in singing at
this time at this time I I started to
play
instruments around age 16 so I was at a
crossroad in my life and I chose singing
Because at the time I remember having a
football coach in high school and it and
I see that as a mercy from Allah because
I feel was
more beneficial for me to take one
another path so that I can be able to
talk about be able to talk about the
experiences of course so I end up
putting football to the side and going
to the side of music because like I
mentioned I had a football coach that
wasn't very just to a lot of the players
and I remember we having an Allstar team
he used to run one play all the time so
this kind of took me away from the
football scene and then I started to
pursue full-time
music going to
Studios first
forming I remember having groups
different group groups I started off in
a singing group form my own
group maybe
around age 13 this is when I formed the
group and later like I mentioned I age
16 deciding to go
fulltime and this group now
was let me
see was about five of us in the
beginning and then I started realizing
later that the group thing wasn't it
wasn't good for me because sometimes you
would people people will rehearse turn
up for rehearsal and then not turn up so
I felt like you know this is like it's a
tuckle it's not really been official
because it's people are not working as
hard as you working because I I I lived
this was my thing my thing was to live
music and not to do it part-time
especially when I when I made that
decision to get away from Sports and to
pursue this full time this is what my
heart was because that's that's what my
heart was from a child you know my
mother had me doing Michael Jackson in
the
home you know sing this Bobby Brown song
performing these performing these songs
at uh family reunions this is this was
the life for me early so this was
something that was that it was bound to
happen um shortly
after I ended up up running into a
friend that
was uh he actually watched me grow up in
the neighborhood he was back home
visiting and uh he had an opportunity to
see me play guitar and
sing and at this time I had
become I become I had become much better
playing guitar I started playing piano
first in high school and then I became
began playing the guitar cuz I wanted to
experience what was it like to to
uh to hear different
instruments so I started playing guitar
and I became good at playing guitar and
singing at the same
time
and he had an opportunity to see me play
and sing and he ended up inviting me to
California maybe about a month
later so I ended up coming to California
going to
California and Subhan Allah as soon as I
got to California soon as I landed the
next day we were going on
meetings that that next day I was in
Magic Johnson's office having a having a
meeting for him to sign me as an artist
on his label and I was going to various
labels at the time I went to Virgin went
to
Sony and ended up going to Death Jam
I never forget these things because they
were this was you know it's amazing
how Allah takes you through a certain
path to experience certain things to be
able to talk about certain
things so I remember Magic Johnson's
label they were going through problems
at the
time so I had a meeting with Def Jam
another meeting another meeting about
four meetings with de J and I ended up
being signed
by a person by the name of Leo Cohen and
Tina
Davis and this is after I met with also
who was a president of Death Jam at the
time was Kevin
lobs signed with Def Jam stayed with Def
Jam for about 2 and A2 years worked with
a lot of different producers such as
Raphael sadik Mike City
uh various different people some people
that
um work have worked with famous people
such as Mary J BL and different
artists
after after staying with Def Jam as I
mentioned for two and a half years end
up parting with him due to
differences worked hard on my
own trying to pursue more of an indep
dependent route as well as taking
meetings to
go and
um seeking a second record deal and I
remember that that probably that next
year after I got off of Death Jam I
probably went on about 13
meetings and no one signed
me and we had speculation that maybe you
know was I was blacklisted because of
some of the people I had in my team
we had speculation but it was all it was
all Mercy from Allah because I look back
on
that you know had I been out there and
and I want to save that for for
later shortly after that now began
really more so doing the independent
thing taking the independent route
trying to push myself out there
performing more
life putting videos up on on the
internet and this is where people
started to more recognize me I was
playing on the street at the time just
to get the
experience just to get the experience
and also have the intention to do
commercials so I ended up Landing a
commercial deal doing
commercials um shortly after that
had a major project in
mine major project to
launch for an international
project and something I still haven't
seen many artists doing to this day but
before I launched that project this is
when I embrace this
now and at that time before that
occurred I had been studying Islam for
about 2 and 1/2 years at that time the
first book I read on
Islam if I remember correctly was a
book written
by translated by Dr B Phillips it was a
book called essay on the
Jin and I read this book first because
one of the brothers noticed that I had a
a fascination with the Unseen he noticed
that I because I had been hearing about
the Unseen since I was a child so I read
about
this I read to I read this book and
Subhan Allah this book blew me away
because he was speaking from evidences
not speaking from his desires a lot of
things that I had read on the Unseen
before that really didn't have evidence
to prove anything to me he was coming
from the evidences that he knew from the
Quran and the Sunnah and even though I
wasn't a Muslim it made total sense to
me
subh shortly after that I end up reading
the
Quran and by the way this Quran was
sitting on my shelf for some time I
don't know why I didn't read it at the
time I couldn't remember I think I was
extremely busy at the
time I end up reading this Quran in my
room and when I was reading this I
remember having a
feeling saying to myself
that there's no way a man could have
written this cuz by that time I had
studied the
Bible I had studied
different religions different ways of
life and I had certain things that would
let me know a list of things that I
follow to let me know whether something
was the truth or not something had to be
Universal number
one that means for all people it had to
be for all people because the church I
grew up in
was a church it was for all black people
it was a church that I didn't see a
single white person nor did I see a
single Arab nor did I see a single
person from M so that the way of life
that that that I was searching for had
to be something Universal for all people
number two it had to be something and
this is not in any particular order of
numbers but it also had to be something
that Associated that didn't associate
anything with the Creator that believed
in one God if something said that we
believe that there's a God besides the
Creator then I will know that religion
is not the
truth and number and another thing it
had to be something that had a book that
hadn't been changed so when I read when
I was reading this Quran in the English
translation it was speaking about all of
the prophets it
wasn't holding one Prophet up here or
one Prophet down here it was speaking of
all the prophets of the Creator all the
prophets of God having the same message
meaning believing in the same God
calling to the worship of this same Lord
so I said to myself and also this Quran
was speaking directly to me it wasn't it
wasn't saying John said this or Mark
said this or anyone said such and such
it was speaking directly to
me so after I read this I said there's
no way a man could have written this and
I entered the Masid I remember entering
the Masid in
LA and I said to myself I said this is
the truth cuz when I enter the Masid
there were people of all different
colors all different colors and shades
and I had never seen that before in my
life never seen that before so that was
another thing that convinced me that
Islam was the truth when I saw that
shortly afterwards I embraced Islam
after some encouragement from some
friends that told me you don't want to
believe say you believe in the heart and
don't accept the slam because I was
dragging on my I was dragging on my
shahada I didn't actually know what the
shahada was for some time so I was
giving da to people about
Islam this is this is very this is crazy
I was calling people to Islam without
being a
Muslim so I found Embrace Islam
myself before putting out that major
project Allah saved me because had I
been out there and Allah knew to to
snatch me away from that at that time
cuz had I been out there way out there
there's no telling whether I would have
accepted the guidance or not accepted
the guidance
Allah how's Islam changed my life where
do I start because there's so many
things that I can speak
about one of them
being that for instance everyone has
problems that they face in their life
everyone everyone deals with the same
issues
Islam gives you the solutions to your
problems it gives you the solutions to
your problems cuz other otherwise we
just be dealing with with problems
without the solutions Islam gave me
these things Islam taught me how to have
a more a higher respect for women I
respected women to a certain degree and
then I disrespected women to a higher
degree because I didn't have I didn't
have the guidance how do you know how to
respect a woman if you don't have the
proper guidance you know I had a good
mother you know I had a good family but
the reality of it is is that you know
you don't you don't know anything you're
misguided without the the guidance of
the Mia the prophets without the
guidance of Allah and him sending the
you know the the prophets to us for this
guidance without this guidance we're in
darkness so Islam has taught me these
things Islam has taught me how to be
generous and more kind to my parents
this is another issue I had you know I
feel like many times that I didn't
respect my mother the way she should be
respected you know and this was a
problem as I was growing up so Islam has
taught me the importance of this Allah
says in the Quran to worship him and to
obey your
parents I wouldn't have learned it
without Islam Islam has taught me to be
more conscious of the poor to be more
conscious of my neighbor your neighbor
has rights over you in Islam so Islam
has taught me this I mean the list goes
on and on the the Islam has taught me to
be more morally
conscious Islam has taught me how to
pray
properly how to pray to one Lord because
as a Christian we didn't know how to
pray we didn't have a clue how to pray
and this is one of the things that
fascinated me one of the things that
fascinated me is that I used to see
Muslims
pray and it used to it used to remind me
of what I saw in the Bible Moses
praying Moses praying a certain way
Jesus praying falling on their faces and
praying Moses and Aaron washing up for
prayer washing up for prayer so Islam
taught me the correct way to do these
things
um
but all in all I say that Islam has
totally transformed me anyone who who
has known me before Islam can testify to
that I don't sit I don't have to sit
here and tell the people how much it has
transformed because people that know me
know that I've been transformed
alhamdulillah praise be to the most high
what advice had you got to non-muslims
and Muslims regarding
Islam as for the non
Muslims I have some very good advice to
give you and this is to reflect on your
purpose of life reflect and think to
yourself are you pleased with your
current
situation and think about this you know
someone like myself for instance my life
was going to clubs playing at nightclubs
and literally waking up the next day
speaking to speaking with many of my
friends and we would speak to each other
and ask ourselves does any of that that
took place last night even matter right
now does any of that even matter anymore
and the question of and the question is
no it didn't matter so I want you to
question
yourself is what you did yesterday
important for your life will these
things assist you when you're in that
grave and this is another thing we we
fail to think about and this is death
questioning
ourselves about the grave reflecting on
the grave is what we're doing beneficial
for our lives in the grave there are
three things that will go with you and
one of them will stay your deeds will be
the only thing that will stay with you
your mother will not be with you your
father will not be with you and so these
are the things for us to reflect on your
children will not be with you so we all
need to reflect on this and if you are
serious about learning about Islam read
from Islamic sources this is very
important read from Islamic sources and
number two ask your lord your creator
the most high ask him sincerely for
guidance to guide you to the truth and
no doubt about it he will guide you to
Islam as for the
Muslims for
you I would encourage you all to to
strive to strive on this path because
the path you're on is correct the path
you're on is correct and I mean as if
you are on the path of the rightly
guided the first three generations if
you're on the path of trying to strive
upon the Quran and the Sunnah you're on
the righteous path and I pray that you
stay on this and I encourage you to
continue with the
Salah on a daily basis if you are even
maybe you maybe you're not praying right
now as you're watching this maybe you're
not praying start make the intention
don't delay make the intention start to
make one Salah then you're making two
Salah but don't say oh I'll do it later
or or I'll change myself later oh I'm
young I'm still
young fear Allah brothers and sisters
you don't have a contract with Allah and
if we say wait till later I wait till
this day then we're trying to what are
we trying to do are we trying to pull
the mick on Allah as we said as brother
say in the UK are we are we trying to
pull a stunt on Allah so reflect on your
life that is my
encouragement and finally I want to give
shout out to brothers from roide to
Islam for inviting me mashallah
beautiful brothers mashallah and um I'm
delighted to have
giving you just a glimpse of my life
once again um our praise is due to the
most high I seek his forgiveness if I've
said anything that is incorrect it's for
myself and the Shan may Allah pray that
Allah rightly guides all of us Keeps Us
rightly guided and guides all of you and
blesses you with a happy place in the
Hereafter a mean asalam
alayum