Q and A With Dr. Laurence Brown

Dear Dr. Brown, Assalamualaikum,

I accidentally found your email address. I don’t know whether you will receive this message, anyway I will continue.

A non-Muslim friend of mine asked me some questions. The friend is a Buddhist.  I want to answer these questions in an effective way that the friend could understand. Can you please help me ? 

I told my friend that this life is a test for the hereafter, so that is why some are poor, some are healthy and some are rich. Then the friend asked me, “if it is that, what is god's criteria to select who will become rich, who will become poor, and who will be healthy?  Even if it is a test shouldn’t  everybody be tested in the same way?  Why does god test us in different ways? If he decides to test in different ways can't some question that this is unjust?

When Muslim women wear the hijab, some people might be curious to see what is inside (because the whole body is covered) which will cause the Muslim women harm. So can we say that it will protect her?

I don’t know whether these questions are illogical. I need to answer in a logical way so the friend may understand that is why I need your help. Can you please help me answer these questions.

Jazakallah khaire. Hoping to hear from you soon.


MY ANSWER:

Assalam alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatu,

Every parent knows that different children prefer different rewards, benefit most from different punishments, and demonstrate love through different sacrifices. What works with one child will not work with another. So it is with people. The test of faith works differently with one person from another. One person worships money more than anything else, so this person's faith is best tested by loss of money. Another values his wife more than anything, or his car, mother, or whatever. So the test will differ according to the differences in human nature, and according to what that person is most attached to. Will you take a rich man and test him with wealth he does not need? Or take someone who hates his children, and test him with the loss of one of the children he couldn't care less about? People are tested according to their dispensation.

As for covering women, this man's question betrays his sickness. What is he saying, that all women should be naked to remove all curiosity? That we should take our showers with the door open, in case he wants to see what we are doing? We cover ourselves (men and women) out of modesty. Only people with sickness in their hearts try to mentally undress others.

Best, and salams,
LBrown

Q & A With Dr. Laurence Brown

A brother living in North America emailed me that he has found himself challenged by the arguments of the Atheists to the point where he feels he is losing his faith. He is struggling, but he is tormented by his fear of losing faith. Family members have read Qur'an over him, but to no avail. What can he do?

My answer: If reading Qur'an or having Qur'an read over you hasn't changed anything, your problem is probably not hassad (evil eye). Rather, you are suffering through the same philosophical issues that have tormented many sincere believers over time. So, the bad news is that these issues really do torment a true believer, but the good news is that they only torment a TRUE believer. See what I mean? If you weren't a true believer these arguments would not torment you. If you were weak in faith or deficient in emaan, you would have thrown your Islam away by now. The fact that you haven't done that indicates that you have true love of Allah and true emaan inside you, but you are struggling against the arguments of the disbelievers. Well, welcome to the club!!! All true believers struggle to explain Islam to the disbelievers. But here is the key thing that you need to understand -- most of Islam IS unseen. Islam CANNOT be proven in the way the atheists and rationalists "prove" things. Emaan (belief) is something Allah places in the hearts of those He loves, and true believers CANNOT guide those for whom Allah has written disbelief. The fact that most disbelievers do not come to Islam does not mean your arguments are wrong, it only means Allah has not written Islam for those people. Likewise, the fact that it is difficult to counter the disbelievers' so-called 'rational' arguments does not mean they are right, just that these are issues that cannot be resolved through rational argument. 

Think of it like a headache. If I have a headache, how can I convince you? I might try to show my pain, but for all you know, I could be faking it. You might call me a liar and tell me you won't believe in my headache until I show it to you, or explain where it came from. But there is no way I can do those things, despite me knowing very well that my headache is real. No matter how hard I grimace and complain, I cannot show you my headache. Well, our religion is something like this example. So much of Islam is unseen -- Allah, the angels and jinn, the Hereafter, Heaven, Hell, Qadr, Emaan, etc. If you have belief, you cannot show or prove your faith to others. All you can do is invite them to true faith, lay out the arguments as best you can, and then see if Allah guides them. Understand that few will follow, and the majority will not. Also understand they will try to misguide you. However, if your emaan is strong enough, as is the case with a headache, they will not be able to convince you that it is not real. 

So, to summarize, you need to leave the arguments of the disbelievers and strengthen your emaan. The fact that you are agonizing over this issue basically proves that you are two things: 

1) human, and troubled by our human weaknesses and 

2) a good muslim at heart, but nonetheless one who needs to strengthen his belief as well as his Islamic understanding in order to safeguard his religion. But take care. If you persist upon listening and engaging in argument with the disbelievers, they can weaken or destroy your faith. Allah tells us to leave talks in which He is being disparaged or in which His religion is being disparaged. Learn to walk away from it. So start by leaving the websites and arguments that have brought you to this crisis, and turn to reading EVERYTHING on my website, http://www.realityofgod.com/. Then, watch my videos on the multimedia page of LevelTruth.com.

And lastly, contact me as needed to both tell me how you're doing, and in case you have any questions. And remember, as the prophet taught us, Islam came as a stranger and will return as a stranger, so give good tidings to strangers. Yes, you are strange (as are all true believers) in the society you are living in. But please understand that this is a sign that you are among those to whom the good tidings of true belief are due.

Q & A With Dr. Laurence Brown

EMAILER: I cannot pray like that, I need evidences and justifications before.. I read Quran 3 times, but its verses are inhumane and unreasonable. While I welcome the truth, I hope Islam is not true. Unbelievers who are so nice go to hell while rude believers somehow end up in heaven where they are awaited 72 virgins. I also see plenty verses where violence is encouraged, barely any verses condemn wrongdoing to Muslims.. homosexuals are also a target... I am not trying to rebel, I hate rebelling, but i don't see strong evidences toward this religion or any in fact.. Many components of such religion are hard for me to support like unbelievers going to hell, homosexuals are sinners or praying 5 times a day.. too much.. :((

MY ANSWER: Like I said, I invite you to read my books -- or not. Up to you. How can I convince you if Allah has sealed your heart and your hearing? I can only bear the message. Only Allah can give you the gift of faith. If you cannot pray to your Creator, don't expect an answer from Him.

Final comment: The lesson is that an impolite exchange can still be manipulated into one in which the message is borne, without transgressing into obscenity or rudeness. Has the Emailer gotten the message? If so, I've done my job in front of Allah. Alhumdulillah.

Q & A With Dr. Laurence Brown

EMAILER: WHY DON'T YOU HELP ME?

MY ANSWER: You didn't write for help -- you wrote to rant. If you want help, pray to our Creator for guidance, read the Qur'an, and I invite you to read my books. The concept of the Abrahamic faiths having been based upon hallucinations resulting from using hallucinogenic plants is as infantile as it is laughable.

Q & A With Dr. Laurence Brown

EMAILER: WHY I AM NO LONGER MUSLIM

THE ORIGIN OF ABRAHAMIC RELIGIONS AND THEIR END..

Thousands of years ago, in the pre monarchic era, sacred plants and other entheogenic substances where politically correct and highly respected for their ability to bring forth the divine, Yahweh, God, The Great Spirit, etc., by the many cultures who used them.

Often the entire tribe or community would partake in the entheogenic rites and rituals.

These rites were often used in initiation into adulthood, for healing, to help guide the community in the decision process, and to bring the direct religious experience to anyone seeking it. In the pre literate world, the knowledge of psychedelic sacraments, as well as fertility rites and astronomical knowledge surrounding the sun, stars, and zodiac, known as astrotheology, were anthropomorphized into a character or a deity; consequently, their stories and practices could easily be passed down for generations.

Weather changes over millenniums caused environmental changes that altered the available foods and plant sacraments available in the local vicinity. If a tribe lost its shamanic El-der (El - God), all of the tribe\'s knowledge of their plant sacraments as well as astronomical knowledge would be lost.

The Church’s inquisitions extracted this sacred knowledge from the local Shamans who were then exterminated…


MY ANSWER: 

Uh, I don't usually say this, but you are clearly bonkers. Please renew your lithium prescription and then stay away from people. You need to be off on your own, digging roots in a forest until your destiny takes you to the reality of the Hereafter, and its punishment for disbelief.

Q & A With Dr. Laurence Brown

EMAILER:

Your articles are very inspring, mashallah. I am a Muslim woman who has a few questions. Hopefully you can answer them:

- the quaran gives details about the rewards for men in heaven e.g. hooris. What does the believing woman get? She might want something similar? How come there's no mention of it?

- men can marry up to four wives at one time. How come women can't marry more than one?

MY ANSWER:

Thank you for your nice words. Regarding the rewards, I can promise you they are good. Uh . . . a whole lot better than what a person will find in the fire!

Seriously, I think the point is not that believing men will have a haram of women in the Afterlife, but that all believers, men and women, will have rewards beyond their imagining, and far in excess of their expectations. So have a good opinion of Allah and understand that He knows best what will be a fitting reward--the one you will be most happy with over all others.

Regarding your other question, you have to remember that the Qur'an is a book of revelation, not a book of political correctness. There is a tendency in this day and age to try to equate men and women, but it is more healthy to recognize there really are differences between the sexes. If you have any doubt about this, read the book, Brain Sex, that discusses the differences in the male and female brains. The fact is that men and women both have strengths and weaknesses that set them apart from one another, and thank Allah for those differences! (chuckles permitted) Sure, men can marry up to four wives, but women can only have one husband. Why is this? Well, think of it from a religious perspective, not from the perspective of hedonistic desires. The point of multiple marriages is not to have fun with multiple partners, but to procreate and increase the number of Muslims, which is pleasing to Allah. In addition, everything in Islam is decent. A man with multiple wives will be able to tell all of his children who their father is, but women with multiple partners cannot know this without a DNA test, and even then, in many countries a large percentage of the population do not have money for food, much less for an expensive DNA test. Think how psychologically devastating it is to children to grow up not knowing who their father is. But there is a deeper issue, and it is this: some criticize Islam on the claim that it is a man's religion. Now, that is simply upside-down thinking. Islam, a man's religion? In fact, Islam curtailed practically everything men like to do -- gambling, drinking, sleeping around, etc, and directed them to clean, moral and productive lives. Yes, Allah gave men the right to four wives, but it gave women rights they never had before as well. For example, a man has to provide for his family, but a woman's money is her own, and the man can't touch it. Islam gave women the right to money, property, education, religion, and many other things they never had before. Islam elevated women in society and in their lives. The point is that Islam is not just a man's or a woman's religion -- no, Islam is a religion for all humanity for all time. Just as men and women are different in certain ways, Islam gives both sexes rights over one another in different ways. If you would like a more complete discussion of this subject, please take a look at my book, The First and Final Commandment (the end of Part III, chapter 5). Then get back to me.

Best,
LBrown
 

Q & A With Dr. Laurence Brown

EMAILER: 

With all respect to your opinion, maybe Muhammad did nothing objectionable in his days, but look what the little girls of today are paying because of his teachings (Title: 450 child brides ages 6-9 married by Hamas in Gaza, in organized mass wedding):

http://rescueachild.hubpages.com/hub/450-child-brides-ages-6-9-married-in-Humas-in-Gaza-in-organized-mass-wedding

MY ANSWER:

Like you, I was disturbed when I first saw this video. We hear about child brides, so we think the worst when we see a video like this. However, I have lived in the Middle East for 13 years, so I knew something is wrong with this video. In thirteen years, I have never known of anyone taking a child bride. This is something that is blown out of proportion in the Western media, as a way of propagandizing against Islam. When I asked my Arab friends, we looked up the event on the internet in Arabic, not in English, and learned the true story. To begin with, the "sheikh" you saw in that video is not a respected scholar -- he's just dressed up to look like one. As a matter of fact, he is wrong on basic issues. For example, Aisha was married at the age of 9, and the marriage was consummated when she was 12. However, by all reports, Aisha was an unusual woman, and she was a fully grown woman at the time her marriage was consummated. Twelve, in her day and age, was adulthood.

Now, about the video. The men you see are NOT marrying the girls you see. The girls are proxy brides. In Islam, the bride does not come out in public in front of men, because men and women do not mix. Brides have their own, private celebration, attended only by other women. I am not familiar with the customs in Palestine, but the Arab brothers here tell me that in this video, because it is a mass wedding with many men around, the woman cannot come out in public, so the bridegroom escorts a proxy bride (the little girl, who is basically a stand-in for her older sister, the real bride. Because of her young age, the child has no restrictions upon her modesty, and she is allowed to be seen in public). What you don't see is that the same thing happens in the women's celebration, in that the women have proxy bridegrooms, in the form of young boys who "stand-in" for the real bridegroom. Because of their young age and immaturity, they are allowed in the presence of the women in the women's celebration. At the end of the celebration, another thing you don't see is the young boys and girls going home as the real bridegroom takes his real (mature) bride to their new home. The children are analogous to the little boy and girl who attend the bride and groom in a Western wedding. In fact, that might be where the tradition comes from, because Europe took much of its language, science and cultural traditions from the Arabs back when the Muslims occupied Europe. The problem here is not just that what is presented in this video is misrepresented to be something it is not, but that this video does not show the whole picture. No doubt, this was done on purpose to make Islam look bad to the viewing audience.

Go to minute 2:15 of this video to see the proxy boys and girls together, with the real bridegrooms in the background (as I said, the brides do not come out in public, so they are not in the picture): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAjqaP8F6b4

This is the worst form of propaganda, because it is an unadulterated lie. People buy it, however, because the Western media is biased in this direction, and the audience is programmed to believe every slander fed to them about Islam.

Now, please stop trying to justify your refusal of Islam. This doesn't wash in front of me, and I doubt very much that it will wash in front of Allah. As Allah teaches us in the Holy Qur'an, most people follow nothing but their desires, and that is what you are doing here. You are looking for the things that satisfy your opinions, and justifying your viewpoint with lies. It would be far better to seek the truth, submit to it, and follow.

Q & A With Dr. Laurence Brown

EMAILER: Dr. Brown, did you really find your answers in Islam? I was a Muslim myself, but I am thinking about converting to christianity because of the bad qualities of Mohammad. He married a 6 years old girl, and consumated the marriage when she was 9, and during those 3 years he molested her. What do you think about that? I wish you could guide me to remove my doubts about Islam.


MY RESPONSE: It is obvious you haven't looked into this very deeply. Muhammad (Peace and Blessings of Allah upon him) did nothing objectionable according to the social standards of his culture and time, although it does offend Western sensitivities in present day. But we live in a different culture and time. Also, you're way off on the ages, and there is no record of him molesting Aisha. Wherever you are getting your information, I suspect you're getting it from people who are trying to draw you away from Islam, rather than from people concerned with an objective search for truth.