209. Islam and the Possibilities of Peace | Mohammed Hijab

[0] Welcome to Season 4, Episode 66 of the Jordan B. Peterson podcast.

[1] In this episode, Dad met with author and philosopher Muhammad Hijab, whose areas of expertise are political philosophy, philosophy of religion, and comparative religion.

[2] They had a very engaging conversation and covered a lot.

[3] Too much to try and recap here, but some highlights were how Islam is seen in the West, its metanarrative, the life of the prophet Muhammad, and the traditionalist take on the Quran.

[4] in Islam itself.

[5] If you enjoy this episode, please be sure to subscribe.

[6] I understand that, and I'm not even saying that there's something exceptional in that regard about Islam, although the rate at which it happened was quite remarkable.

[7] But it still presents us with a problem, doesn't it?

[8] I mean, everyone, it presents everyone with a problem.

[9] And the problem is, well, for example, the problem is reconciling the idea of turning the other cheek with the idea of a just war, a defensive war, or an expansive war, for that matter.

[10] And of course, that issue is relevant to Islam because Islam exploded outward and produced the biggest empire of the world had ever seen in the space of a few short centuries.

[11] So then you ask, well, so then you ask, well, what's the spirit?

[12] What is the spirit that animated that?

[13] And is that attributable to the Islamic doctrines themselves?

[14] I don't know the answer to that.

[15] Now, let me tell you the answer to that, okay?

[16] And this is what I want to tell you conclusively, and this will help build bridges, honestly.

[17] Because we can maintain the warlord thesis, we can maintain the expansionist thesis but here's what i'll tell you islam has a has a capability to be expansive and it also has a capability of making peace treaties and it does and it should do whatever's in its best interest just like every country should do whatever's in his best interest Hello, everyone.

[18] I'm pleased today to have as my guest discussant, Muhammad Hijab.

[19] And this discussion has been postponed a number of times because of illness.

[20] And I'm very glad that we're able to do it today.

[21] And I thank him for his patience in continuing to pursue this and being willing to talk to me, despite, I think, being delayed three times, which is one more time than is unforgivable.

[22] But in any case, Mohammed Hijab is an author, a student of comparative religion and a philosopher of religion.

[23] He's the co -founder of Sapience Institute and is a researcher and instructor for that organization.

[24] He has a BA in politics and a master's degree in history.

[25] He's acquired a second master's in Islamic Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies.

[26] Hejab has also completed a third master's degree in applied theology from the University of Oxford, where he focused on the philosophy of religion in applied settings.

[27] He's now doing his PhD in the philosophy of religion on the contingency argument for God's existence.

[28] And many people, I was looking a while back for people to talk about Islam with.

[29] And many people recommended that I talked to Muhammad Hijab.

[30] And so I talked to Mustafa Akul a couple of weeks ago.

[31] He's known more, I would say, on the liberal front.

[32] And so I'm very pleased to be able to talk to Muhammad Hijab today.

[33] Thank you very much for joining me today.

[34] It's very good of you to put up with the delays.

[35] No, no, no, no. Thank you for having me, honestly.

[36] It was a pleasure.

[37] Well, so I'm going to ask some really basic questions because it's very difficult to understand another culture from the outside.

[38] And you also have, as an outsider, you have no idea how much you don't know about what you don't know even.

[39] You're blind to your own ignorance.

[40] And so I'm going to start with basic questions.

[41] I wouldn't say that I have a tangible understanding of Islam.

[42] I mean, I have some understanding of Christianity.

[43] I've been able to get the sense of Christianity at a reasonably deep level, I would say, at least compared to other things I know.

[44] And I've kind of felt the same way about certain aspects of Buddhism and Taoism.

[45] But as a religious system, a system of thought, Islam has remained relatively opaque to me, despite the fact that I've done a reasonable amount of historical reading.

[46] And so what is it in terms of practice and belief that are absolutely core as far as you're concerned to practicing the Islamic faith?

[47] Well, the first thing is I think we should start with the bare bones basics.

[48] And the bare bones basics is first to say that we believe in God.

[49] And the kind of God we believe in is one God worthy of worship.

[50] In fact, the Quran makes a series of arguments, rational arguments, for why we believe in the type of God that we believe in.

[51] For example, in Chapter 52, verse 35 of the Quran, it says, am chulikum in ghii 'en, am hum al -shaelikun, were they created from nothing, or by nothing, or were they themselves the creators of themselves?

[52] Did they create the heavens and the earth?

[53] They have no certainty.

[54] In other words, the Quran is hinting here at the fact that it's impossible for something to come from nothing, and it's impossible also for something to give rise to itself.

[55] And so the universe, for example, if we take this as an example, couldn't have come from nothing, And it couldn't have created itself.

[56] It couldn't be self -generating and or self -maintaining.

[57] And there can't be a world, in fact, the Quran would indicate.

[58] They cannot be a world with only dependent things, things that require other things in order to exist, add infinitin.

[59] And so what is required outside of the series of dependent things is something which is independent, which all things depend upon, and which itself depends upon nothing.

[60] And this is what the Quran refers to as As Samad, or the idea of God being self -sufficient and independent.

[61] So the idea of God is...

[62] So it's a prime mover argument, and you think...

[63] It's a kind of prime mover argument.

[64] A lot of...

[65] Why do you think that the same argument that you put forward in relationship to the generation of the universe can't be put forward as an objection in relationship to God?

[66] you know, because you make a logical case that something can't come from nothing and something can't create itself.

[67] But you move from a philosophical perspective, this isn't a religious critique.

[68] From a philosophical perspective, you just move the problem back one step.

[69] What advantages do you think there are to moving the problem back one step, or am I mischaracterizing it?

[70] Well, I'll tell you what Dr. Joseph Peterson, what you've said is very similar to what Richard Dawkins said in a debate with the then -archbishop of Canterbury.

[71] And he said that, well, if you have, and he said this debate, he made this argument in Oxford, and he said that if you look at the universe, well, if you're saying that God has made the universe in this way, then your God who's more complicated, and he would add this layer of complexity.

[72] Your God is more complicated would require it even greater.

[73] He would require an even greater explanation.

[74] You're a greater God.

[75] Yeah, yeah.

[76] So really interestingly, Anthony Kenny, who's, an agnostic himself is a philosopher agnostic he came in and he said well actually take a look at this you've got an electric razor which is made up of many different component parts and you have a cut throat razor which is made up of one part and he said although the the electric razor is more complicated it serves less functions than the cut throat razor because the cut throat razor can cut throat and it can also cut an apple for example and so it's it's a fallacy to assume that just just because something is complicated or that something has many features and attributes, that that thing itself requires an explanation.

[77] And in fact, if we had an infinite regress of such explanations, then obviously that would lead to a kind of absurdity.

[78] So even, you know, well -meaning atheists and agnostics in the field realize the redundancy and the fallacity and the argument that is put forward by the likes of Richard Dawkins, who said that kind of thing.

[79] And I would also add to that one point, the argument from composition, which is usually a corollary to the contingency argument usually, is made in the following way, that everything that is made of parts is contingent, that the universe or say a multiverse is made up parts, therefore a universe or the universe and or the multiverse is contingent.

[80] The parts that we are talking about, meteorologically, are things that can be attached and detached.

[81] So that doesn't apply to God.

[82] Classical seeism doesn't say that God is made of parts the same way as human beings are or as universes are or multiverses are.

[83] And in fact, the Quran hints at this itself.

[84] It says, Lhlechalek, in any suratim nashaa rakabak.

[85] That the one who created you and composed you and configured you in any form that he wished, he put you together.

[86] And so the fact that you have such configuration in the universe indicates that the fact that you have an external sorting agent that has particularized the universe in a certain way and that has composed the universe in a certain way.

[87] So the argument really is that things which are made of attachable and detachable parts, that those things are contingent.

[88] That doesn't apply to God on any theistic paradigm.

[89] Now, what we would say, though, sorry to kind of drag this on a little bit, is that this would disqualify something like the Trinity from being true.

[90] And in fact, the Quran, this is the Islamic position, is vehement.

[91] in its opposition towards a triune god.

[92] So, for example, in chapter 23, verse 91, it says, matthagah, Allah, from a laddin, and ma cana ma 'an ma 'a 'u 'u 'u 'elahe 'u 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a 'a.

[93] But God hasn't taken a son, and he doesn't have any gods with him.

[94] If that had been the case, each God would have taken what he has created, and they would have tried to dominate one another.

[95] The idea, therefore, that there can be more than one all -powerful entity is an inconceivable and unintelligible idea from the Islamic paradigm.

[96] So it's seen as problematic to say the least or conceptually impossible to say even more to suggest that something like a Trinity can be true.

[97] When it's talking about, for example, Mary and Jesus, it says something very simple, that both of them used to eat food.

[98] So in other words, the impossibility of something limited like Jesus, a man, being God at the same, time, being unlimited, because the definition of God is that he's unlimited is all powerful.

[99] Do you think that there's a divine spark in human beings?

[100] No, we don't think there's any kind of divinity at all.

[101] Islam is categorical about this, because the way we define divinity is extremely strict.

[102] We say that the divine attributes of God are specific only to God.

[103] So what's the characteristic element of the human relationship with God.

[104] So what's the central, what's the central, what's the central, what you say, structure of value within a human being that makes them worthy of respect, say, in the sight of God or worthy of value in the side of God?

[105] The Quran states, Laqad Karamna bani Adam.

[106] We have, we have dignified the child of Adam.

[107] So that we do believe in something called human exceptionalism.

[108] We do believe that human being has been specialized or specified among all other things in creation, to have free will, for example, to have a personal relationship with God, to have a loving relationship with God.

[109] People don't realize this, especially from the Christian tradition, but one of the names of God from the Islamic tradition is that he's the loving one, Al -Wadud in Arabic, in the Quran as well.

[110] So we believe that the relationship that human beings should have with God is a loving relationship, but it's one of submission.

[111] This is the main thing.

[112] Islam doesn't mean peace.

[113] Islam actually means submission.

[114] Islam comes from the root Arabic word, is Islam and what it means is submission and really what the picture is in the islamic cosmology is that everything in the universe is submitting to god everything the laws of nature have been placed there by the lawmaker which is god and so we as human beings are volitional we have free we do believe in free will but we also believe in a theological compatibility and so that a kind of predetermination is actually one of our pillars of faith to believe in that so in that sense we have to voluntarily submit to God in the same way that everything else in creation is what does what does that submission mean what that means is that all the prophets and messengers came a four time so this is the meta narrative of Islam Abraham came Moses came and all of them came with exactly the same message and that message is to worship to believe in one God and to worship in only one God and to do that you have to follow a guidance so each and every single one of those messengers they came with we believe in our narrative, they came with two things effectively.

[115] They came with a message, which is to worship God, meaning to submit to his laws, and also with some kind of evidence base to suggest that they are prophets.

[116] So some of these stories would have been known, obviously to you, you've done a biblical series.

[117] So I know you're very aware of those stories.

[118] We have very similar stories, like in Moses, Abraham, Jesus, but they are slightly different.

[119] Those stories are slightly different.

[120] In fact, sometimes radically different, especially considering some New Testament kind of narratives.

[121] And so what the thread that joins or the flesh that joins, all of these kind of messengers and prophets, is that they all came with one fundamental message, which is to believe one God, worship one God.

[122] We believe that the Prophet...

[123] Okay, so hold, hang on.

[124] I'm still not understanding this exactly.

[125] Okay.

[126] I'm not sure what you mean by believe like the way you laid that out was in some sense propositional right right you made a you made a logical argument for the existence of god but yeah you you you take the existence of god as as given in some sense to begin with because of your faith and then you provide your belief with a rational argument but it wasn't derived from a rational argument and so i don't so does it when you talk about belief do you mean belief in a set of propositions about the nature of god and And if you do or don't, what do you believe?

[127] And how would you separate out that belief from what you term as worship?

[128] Right.

[129] So actually, there's one thing that ought to be known.

[130] In Islamic theology, we believe in something called the Fittra, which is an innate instinct to believing in God.

[131] And now, I'm not sure if you're aware of the work on it.

[132] So why bother with the propositional arguments then?

[133] To me, they just seem like a side venture, you know, to argue with science.

[134] Some scholars have said that in Islam, sorry, I apologize.

[135] Yeah, okay.

[136] No, no. In fact, some modern -day philosophers of religion have that kind of a stance, like Alvin Planting God, he seems quite, you know, agnostic about the old thing.

[137] I mean, we can, the thing is, what we're saying is, it would be committing something like the naturalistic fallacy to suggest that just because something is the case, or there is a fault, maybe, just because something is the case that it ought to be the case.

[138] So in order to prove the, it's a demonstrative proof for those who are in what we call shek or doubt.

[139] And this, but the truth is, as you've mentioned, and as in the literature, like for example, Justin Barrett has this in his cognitive psychological or cognitive science literature.

[140] I'm not sure if you come across his stuff.

[141] But basically, yeah, basically what he says is that we have an innate, his words exactly receptive.

[142] to believing in God.

[143] In 2011, the Oxford Anthropological Society, they've done a huge study of 32 ,000 children.

[144] And what they found is that children innately and intuitively, instinctively, have a belief of a higher power of some sorts.

[145] Now, they are born with that belief.

[146] And in fact, in one of the papers in Justin Barrett's book, he literally mentions the Fetra or the Islamic theological concept of an instinct in believing in God.

[147] What's his last name?

[148] Barrett.

[149] How do you spell that?

[150] I think double R, double T, I believe.

[151] Justin Barrett.

[152] Okay, that's useful.

[153] Yeah, well, it just strikes me that, you see, the problem with debating people like Richard Dawkins about the existence of God is that he will formulate the argument in propositional terms and then force the person, so to speak.

[154] I don't imply any melis on his part, but as soon as you accept, that the battle is to be won on propositional grounds, you've already accepted a certain definition of God.

[155] And I think you lose the argument instantly.

[156] I think the argument for instinct, something like that, is much more powerful.

[157] Because one of the things I'm led to wonder when you laid out your argument is, well, what purpose does belief in God serve, or your faith in God, let's say?

[158] And I think belief see it's also really interesting to try to distinguish between belief in something and faith in something like if you have imagine you have faith in the good and so how do you demonstrate that well you believe that good is more powerful than evil you believe that you should act in a manner that's that's that's appropriate to the good and so then you act that way and that's the faith the faith is demonstrated in the actions yes but it's not exactly it's not exactly propositional And, you know, partly because I would say, if you look at good and evil, for example, it's not that easy to make the case that good is more dominant or more powerful than evil, all things considered in human affairs.

[159] Now, I think it is.

[160] But you know what I mean?

[161] You can't make a compelling propositional case that that's absolutely true.

[162] But you can reflect your faith in your actions.

[163] The thing is, you mentioned Richard Dawkins.

[164] I wrote, as part of the Sapiens Institute, we wrote a small booklet called the Scientific Delusions of the New Atheists.

[165] And we refuted him on these kind of things.

[166] If you read the God delusion, he literally spends five pages of hundreds talking about the cosmological argument.

[167] And I think, too, talking about the teleological argument or the fine -tune argument.

[168] I do think that not much work has been done by new atheists in new atheists, meaning like, you know, the four horsemen or whatever, in trying to actually tackle these arguments.

[169] And sometimes when they're on debates with other philosophers of religion, I don't think they, from my perspective, at least, they don't actually provide a satisfactory defense.

[170] Yeah, well, the instinct argument is an interesting one because it seems to me that part of the, and this is why I was pressing you to some degree on the issue of the definition of worship is that I don't see much difference between the instinct to worship and the instinct to imitate.

[171] And I do believe that there's compelling evidence, psychological and biological, that we human beings have a remarkably strong instinct to imitate.

[172] And the question is, well, what is it that we're oriented to imitate?

[173] And I think we're like if you look at the developmental psychology literature, for example, it seems quite, it seems to be the case that if a child has an intact nervous system and they have one or two good models around them, that they'll be drawn towards those good models and imitate them and develop quite healthily, even under the same.

[174] rather stressful circumstances.

[175] And, you know, that instinct to imitate also underlies phenomena, phenomena like the experience of awe and the experience of charisma.

[176] And that charisma, you know, has an effect on attentional function and on the proclivity to behave.

[177] And so I think the propositionalized arguments deliver the religious ideas over to the propositional camp.

[178] And that's dominated already by scientists in many ways.

[179] It's a losing battle.

[180] I don't think it's the right one.

[181] So worship, you just, so, okay, so one thing the West and Islam agree on, although I think Islam is part of the West, by the way, because we're all people of the book.

[182] I mean, the triune God in the Christian sense is still subordinate to a higher order unity.

[183] And so, and so there is a powerful movement towards monotheism in Judaism and Christianity in Islam.

[184] And that seems to be a point of some agreement.

[185] We're also, all three societies are also people who've made a decision collectively in some mysterious manner that a book should sit at the basis of culture, a specific book that's been aggregated in a strange way, in a mysterious way.

[186] And so we also agree on that.

[187] And so that's, you know, that's a starting place at least.

[188] And obviously there's been a lot of interpenetration of ideas between Islam and Judaism and Christianity.

[189] I mean, the prophets in Islam are the same prophets that go through the three major Western monotheistic religions.

[190] And so that's a fair bit of commonality.

[191] And so that's a good place to start building bridges.

[192] And so, okay, so Islam is stringently monotheistic.

[193] And then the submission idea, what exactly, I mean, God is ineffable in a sense.

[194] And so what does submission mean exactly?

[195] And how is that related to worship?

[196] And how is that related to the good, let's say, on a practical level?

[197] Right.

[198] So I think what you said before, there was a point you made about defining faith through action.

[199] And I think that we would strongly agree with that.

[200] And that's what we believe.

[201] Our definition of faith is what you basically believe in the heart, say on the tongue, and do with your actions.

[202] That's like a definition of faith for us or imam, the idea of imam.

[203] In terms of in terms of the good, now there are different conceptions in Islam of the good.

[204] But the main thing is, we believe that God is good, quite similar to what Christians believe, and therefore he wants good for human beings, and that the injunctions of God are also good.

[205] In terms of submission, and this is extremely important here, submission can only be done through revelation.

[206] That is our position.

[207] The position is that submission is actually impossible without a guidance.

[208] And the guidance, we believe, obviously, is the Quran.

[209] But we also acknowledge the, we also acknowledge the Torah, the original Torah that was sent to Moses and the original Ingeal or the gospel that was sent to Jesus.

[210] But what we have is we can call it a doctrine of taherif, which means corruption.

[211] So what we believe is that what happened is with these books, you've had basically corruption happened to them.

[212] So we don't know what is part of that book and what is not part of that book.

[213] We don't know exactly what Jesus said and what isn't because there is no clear chain of narration back to Jesus Christ, but going back to the point of submission, submission is to follow the prophets, all of them, because a Muslim cannot be a Muslim unless they believe in, revere, love and respect, all of the prophets, including Jesus, Moses, Abraham, and all of them, follow all of them and in their way.

[214] And once again, we believe that they were divinely inspired.

[215] So, and there was evidence that all of these prophets come with.

[216] And I think I was on that point on, I was telling you that the differentiating factor between the prophet Muhammad and the rest of the prophets is we believe whereas all of the other prophets came for their people and their time.

[217] We believe that Muhammad came for all people and all times.

[218] That's certainly what Christians say about Christ.

[219] Yes, but in the Bible you'll find some verses that are saying I've only been sent for the lost sheep of Israel.

[220] And so there's some tension.

[221] You know, you see this, you see something like the rise of a universalism, a spirit of universalism that surpasses fundamental tribalism, even of a religious sort.

[222] And it seems, there seems to be a struggle that takes place in the gospel in some sense conceptually between this reversion to something that's more tribal and something that's genuinely universal.

[223] But I think the universalist spirit wins out quite clearly.

[224] In otherwise, Christianity wouldn't be an evangelizing religion.

[225] It's designed to try to bring everyone under the fall, let's say.

[226] It's largely because of the tension, sorry.

[227] It's largely because the tension between paul and james and a lot of well modern -day christianity is based on poor line kind of interpretations rather than kind of james was very much a man of the law himself he was you know he didn't believe that the law was abrogated he didn't believe that in fact there's huge tension obviously in in the bible between both those two men and obviously there's historical reasons for that as well but what we will say is that we would say that there are clear verses in the Bible, like for example, we point to Isaiah 4211, where there indicates a new prophet that's going to come.

[228] And in fact, Isaiah 4211 in particular is extremely important because it even specifies the region.

[229] It says it will be sent to the people of Kedar.

[230] And the people of Kedar as in Genesis, Kedar was the son of Ishmael and basically from him is the lineage of Muhammad or the Arabs, if you like.

[231] And so it is a whole discussion.

[232] in the whole of Isaiah 42 about a new prophet going to come and he is going to come to the people of Kedar and the people will be rejoicing on the mountain tops and in fact the name of a mountain in Medina which is present -day Saudi Arabia is mentioned which is the mount of Selah and and so we would say that actually Muhammad was a continuation of Jesus Christ and that Jesus Christ as a prophet also in the Bible doesn't say that there's not going to be another prophet after me and so that there's no reasonable reason for us to think at all ending.

[233] I think Christ actually said that believers would be able to do the things he did and more.

[234] So there's actually a prophecy of a multitude of prophets in some sense, which would perhaps be a consequence of taking the fundamental doctrine, the spiritual doctrine of Christianity seriously.

[235] Yes, I mean, as we said, in interpretation, in many ways we are all followers of Christ.

[236] And that's another point of commonality.

[237] like we we see the messiah jesus christ as a man who had done wonders and miracles and signs as the bible states we believe that he was immaculately conceived we believe that he cured the blind he raised the dead with god's permission we believe all like most of the things that you'll find we actually believe in those things there's huge commonalities between islam and christianity from that perspective the major difference is we would say that it's not intelligible or conceivable or pardonable to believe any human being with a day of birth can never be called God.

[238] And this is where we kind of diverge from the Christian mainstream.

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[269] And of course, Dostoevsky was talking about exactly the same things at pretty much exactly the same time.

[270] But the philosopher of religion, Murcher Eliad, in his historical investigations, indicated that the death of God is something that has happened to many cultures in many places over many times.

[271] It's not a unique event in, let's say, Western history.

[272] And his explanation for that, at least in part, was that as there's a movement towards unification under a monotheistic umbrella, let's say, which is perhaps a precondition for the union of diverse people, one of the consequences of that is that central unifying value becomes so abstracted because it has to cover such a multiplicity.

[273] so abstracted that it becomes sufficiently, it flies away in something.

[274] He called that Deus abscondus, if I remember correctly, is that the idea of the spirit just flies away because it no longer has an attachment to the world.

[275] And one of the ways that Christianity solved that, if you think about it from a psychological perspective, was by insisting upon the presence of God in a kinetic form, right, in an emptied form, in a partially emptied form, in the person of Christ in a particular place and a particular time.

[276] And it's a variant of the prophetic idea, although taken to its absolute extreme, the prophetic idea is that there are people who are marked out in history, marked out by God, by their relationship with what's highest in some spectacular manner.

[277] And so I guess one of the things I would say about the Islamic resistance to the idea of the divinity of Christ is that there is an emphasis on Islam on the special status of prophets, of certain prophets, and their particular special relationship with God, which seems to elevate them above other men in some important sense.

[278] And drawing a line precisely between that claim and the claim of divinity incarnate is not an easy matter.

[279] I would actually disagree with that.

[280] I think there's a clear distinction in the Quran between the prophets and ordinary men.

[281] This is actually one of the clearest distinctions.

[282] Yes, but is there a clear distinction between the prophets and some spark of divinity inside those men?

[283] Yes.

[284] What do we define as a spark of divinity?

[285] Well, I would say it's partly what gives people charisma, although it's not always that.

[286] It's also partly what marked these men out as being prophets.

[287] I mean, it's what we look at when we say, that man is great.

[288] That's a great man. That's a great person.

[289] That was a great deed.

[290] Well, yes, yes, fair enough.

[291] But I would say also embodied virtue.

[292] And it's embodied virtue that is in some sense reflective of the action of the highest value operating at a local scale.

[293] Yeah, so that's exactly what we believe.

[294] We believe in the doctrine of infallibility or isma.

[295] And so we believe that all prophets basically did the best thing possible for human beings.

[296] And this is narrated about the prophet Muhammad.

[297] in fact, you know, the Quran in chapter 68, verse 2, that, and you have impeccable virtue, basically the highest level virtue.

[298] And this is something about all the prophets.

[299] And obviously, if that wasn't the case, they wouldn't be sufficient guides for us in terms of humanity.

[300] So if that's what you mean by the spark of divinity, then I don't think there's a point of resistance.

[301] Yeah, well, these things are hard to sort out, right?

[302] The terminology, and that's part of the complexity of these sorts of discussions.

[303] Yeah.

[304] Yeah.

[305] For us, divinity is basically having the attributes of God.

[306] So once again, since we know God through his attributes, from that perspective, that human beings cannot possess the fullness of the attributes of God.

[307] If you want, I can recite.

[308] That seems like a perfectly reasonable perspective.

[309] I mean, you know, we're all limited infallible creatures.

[310] And we'd be fools not to see that.

[311] The attributes of God, how are they?

[312] knowable is that only through relationship with the with the book or is that is that also does that also have an experiential element as far as you're concerned so what i can do in fact is i can recite for you a couple of verses from the quran because what we believe is they have they are known through the revelation and i can recite for you maybe 10 20 second verses and translate for you and show you what i think it will give you more of a flavor of what you believe sure do what you will So the Quran states in the end of chapter 59 He was Allah, There's a la ilah, Ilah, Allahe Alim of Waibe and shahadha and Rahman and Rahim Who Allah Allah, Allah, al -Malik, Kudus, Ssalam, M 'emimimin, Mahimin, al -Aziziz, Jabbar, Muthakabir.

[313] Subhanna Allah on what you shrieku He was Allah the caliq al - barri to him al -asmah al -housna you sabh to him in the samawati and he's al -a - al -a -eas - al -a -eem So let me read the translation from I don't want to get this wrong, right?

[314] These two verses I think are probably the two best verses that answer your question in the Quran.

[315] Allah is he.

[316] I'm going to get something maybe a bit better.

[317] Translation.

[318] All right.

[319] Masun Khan.

[320] He is Allah that there is no God worthy of worship except for him.

[321] The king, the holy, the one free from all defects.

[322] The giver of security.

[323] The watch over his creatures.

[324] The mighty, the compelor, the supreme.

[325] Glory be to him.

[326] glory be to god high is he above all that they associate as partners with him he is allah the creator the inventor of all things the bestower of forms to him belong the best names all that is in the heavens and the earth glorify him and he is the almighty the all wise so these are i would say the two potentially the two best verses that summarize for us so right so it's an attempt to use a multiplicity of virtues to decide to define a supreme source of good.

[327] So, okay, I have a technical question for you, a procedural question, I guess.

[328] When we're talking, so you sang those verses, and then, so here's what happened, I asked you that question, you sang those verses or chanted them, or a combination of those two, okay, but there's a melodic element to that, and I don't understand the language, and then you translated them, and so why approach the answer to my question in that manner?

[329] Because we believe that the Quran in its original language has an element in it or has a virtue if you like to it or an attribute to it which cannot be felt or experienced phenomenologically if you like just mere translation we believe so yeah and so what what purpose does that serve in the discussion with someone like me what it would do hopefully because we believe the quran has divine qualities itself the Quran itself has divine qualities so we believe number one it's a cure we believe it's a physical cure as well as a spiritual cure we believe that it's a guidance we believe that it's something which will literally put you in a psychological say of ease so in a sense what it will do it hopefully you know will have an effect on you which is physiological maybe psychological And in a sense, it's like giving you something to taste rather than just explaining what it tastes like, you know.

[330] And so that's why I feel this.

[331] How do you know when that's, how do you know when that's appropriate and when it's not?

[332] It's always appropriate.

[333] I mean, you obviously don't all the, well, but you don't.

[334] Yeah, I don't mean that.

[335] No, but, but so that's why I asked the question.

[336] It's obviously you're making distinctions.

[337] You're not, you're not doing what you just did with.

[338] Well, it is your piece.

[339] I want to give you the full Islamic experience.

[340] you see yeah okay okay you know what i mean so yeah okay part of it is to part of it is to let you hear what the Quran sounds like um so you can kind of if you hear it maybe you go somewhere to a muslim country and you hear that in the background or you maybe even walking down i don't know you're from alberto is it yes yeah maize you know that yeah i think you've mentioned it before i've been to i've been to edmonton actually in canada there's there's a muslim community there maybe you'll hear it in someone driving and oh i remember that i know what that is you know so it's just to gain maybe so why did that make you smile because because that would make me happy i mean quite quite openly and honestly because we want the best i mean to be honest with you if you want to be totally honest yeah now that's what i'm hoping for yeah right what you asked me before we start the show i mean one of our not objectives but one of our hopes okay is that people embrace islam and become muslims that's Islam is an evangelizing religion It's a religion which aims literally to enter every home There is actually a prophetic saying that says that Islam will enter every home Not necessarily meaning everyone become Muslim But it will enter every home in some way, shape or form You mean like what's happening right now with this podcast?

[341] There you have it, you see, it's part of it No, there's a series of predictions that the Prophet makes And this is part of the evidence package, we believe Okay, so you also talked about the fact You know, when we started, just before we started this that part of the reason that you're talking with me is that you hope to build bridges.

[342] And so this gets down to some, and I want to return to the fundamental attributes of Islamic belief.

[343] I don't want to let that part of the conversation lag.

[344] But, you know, Christianity is also an evangelizing religion, and Christians hope the same thing.

[345] So, while you know what that has caused and is still causing, and so, you know, we have to contend with this, all of us that are alive now.

[346] And so we have two evangelizing religions.

[347] They're both fundamentally monotheistic.

[348] They emerge from a tradition that's quite similar.

[349] There's many things that they have in common.

[350] But the border between them has been rife with conflict for a very long time.

[351] And that has not ended.

[352] And it's become more distributed and so forth.

[353] And one of the things about Islam, I would say, that frightens the West is that the especially in the modern world, is that it appears that it's difficult for religions that aren't Islam in Islamic countries to manage to maintain themselves to any degree whatsoever.

[354] And now, look, I understand, I said that with a certain understanding also in mind.

[355] When I look at this from a psychological or an anthropological perspective, I also see that as human societies have come together and organized themselves in ever increasing sized groups that the necessity for an emergent monotheism as a uniting factor might be crucial and it's clearly the case that the emergence of islam united diverse people and in that union there is a kind of peace that's that's the definition of union and how much strife and force and conflict and catastrophe had to attend that unification is a matter of debate we don't know how these things can be managed we don't don't know how to manage them any better.

[356] But we're still stuck with this problem.

[357] Now we have two fundamental monotheisms that are head to head.

[358] I know that's an oversimplification.

[359] And hypothetically, we're both motivated by the desire for something approximating peace.

[360] And so, and we want to build bridges, and that's why you and I are talking.

[361] Yes.

[362] But, but I don't know what to do with the mutual evangelical, uh, what would you say?

[363] Impulse.

[364] Like my sense is Christians turn to yourself.

[365] a problem.

[366] You can fix yourself.

[367] You do that and the other things are going to sort themselves out of their own accord.

[368] And I do believe that.

[369] And I actually believe that that message is in some sense centrally Christian.

[370] It's like look to yourself and be the example.

[371] And that's the best way of, let's say, convincing other people if that's what you're interested.

[372] And it's also the only real effective way of bringing peace.

[373] So, well, I'm not sure.

[374] I'm a traditionalist Muslim, okay, which means I'm orthodox, I'm not a liberal at all.

[375] In fact, I oppose liberalism, to be quite honest with you, in the sense that I criticize it.

[376] I don't think it's the truth with the capital T. So a lot of Enlightenment ideas, I oppose them openly, right?

[377] And so I'm speaking from the perspective of someone who is a traditionalist Muslim.

[378] And by that I mean, I stick to the Quran and the sunnah, which is the prophetic sayings, and the Jewish prudential tradition, which is derived from those two sources and other sources as well.

[379] But this is a traditionalist perspective, which I think represents the majority.

[380] Here's what I will say.

[381] The first order of business, Jordan Peterson, Dr. Jordan Peterson, is for us, I think, to acknowledge that both religions have a capability of peace.

[382] Okay?

[383] This is extremely important.

[384] And that requires education.

[385] So I'm just going to be honest with you.

[386] Like, for example, the warlord comment that you made, okay?

[387] I've, about the prophet, I think that is part of the problem.

[388] I have to be honest.

[389] Yeah, I want to get to that.

[390] Dr. Jordan, where, here's a thing that I don't see you as some kind of enemy of Islam.

[391] I genuinely don't.

[392] I see that we need to.

[393] Yeah, and I don't want to be either.

[394] I have lots of people in the Islamic world who are listening to what I'm doing and watching and being supportive.

[395] This is part of it.

[396] And here's what I'll say to you.

[397] No, I can tell you that as a matter of fact, like Michael's friends and.

[398] traditionalist Muslims listen to you.

[399] I mean, that's for sure.

[400] In fact, they love your stuff.

[401] You think they'd have something better to do?

[402] No, no, no, no. Because a lot of your views kind of coalesce with the Islamic viewpoints, especially on like the nuclear family, on alcohol.

[403] I know you've done your PhD on alcohol, actually, your thesis.

[404] And obviously, Islam is one of the only religions in the world that bans alcohol completely and drugs and stuff.

[405] But going back to the point, like, we said we want to build bridges and we said we want to understand each other.

[406] And I think what you said there's important.

[407] We do have two evangelizing religions.

[408] We have to look at the character and the life story of the prophet.

[409] Because with the Prophet Muhammad, here's two things that we have to look at.

[410] Number one, there was the Meccan period.

[411] And I'm sure you're aware in that period, the Prophet Muhammad was, you know, first of all, he was an orphan, and then he got married to a woman at the age of 25.

[412] Her name was Khadija.

[413] She was actually his boss.

[414] And then after that, you know, he said that he received revelation at the age of 40 in the in the mountain in the cave sorry and then after that there was a time of persecution and then after that um he went he went to different places he went to taif which is a place outside of mecca he went to al -aulsu al -hazra who are two clans two tribes and what it was is that he was he was trying to get support for his project or the monotheistic project because he was being boycotted, etc. He eventually got it from Al -Elwil -Hazraj, these two tribes because they actually believed in the religion of Islam.

[415] This is documented, like, without a shadow of a doubt.

[416] This is what happened.

[417] And then...

[418] Is this in the Medina?

[419] Is this the Medina period that you're speaking of?

[420] So this is actually, technically, the Meccan period.

[421] Okay, still the Meccan period.

[422] Yeah, so right before Medina literally was established, because Medina is...

[423] It was so called after the Prophet.

[424] Because Medina just literally means the city in Arabic.

[425] It was called Yethri before, and then they changed it into Medina to Nebi.

[426] the city of the prophet and so that's why it was kind of called Medina after that in that time period so we've got 13 years of Medina the vast majority I'm not going to say at all but the vast majority of wars that took place in fact all of the wars that took place before the conquest of Mecca were defensive so the pagan Arabs went to Medina and tried to siege it Bedr, O 'Hod, Ahzab or the Kandak and all of these are names of wars and in fact there was according to Bukai and one scholar there were 19 such wars in 10 years.

[427] So that's almost an average of two wars every year.

[428] And for me, I see that actually as an evidence for profit because the prophet was actually fighting in these wars.

[429] He wasn't just throwing people around telling him to fight for him.

[430] He was fighting in them and there were defensive wars.

[431] So in that time period, what happened was, I'll give you one example.

[432] Okay, so let me interject something there because that's, that's very, that's a very hard thing for me to get straight in my mind.

[433] Yes.

[434] Now, I would say that and the division in Islam that occurred almost immediately upon Muhammad's death, and which has not been rectified to this day, quite the contrary.

[435] That's also, you know, that's a problem for everyone.

[436] It's a problem for Muslims.

[437] It's a problem for Christians.

[438] It's a problem for everyone.

[439] And it's a problem that could really get out of hand.

[440] Now, it's not like I don't know that the Protestants and the Catholics were at each other's throats for, you know, hundreds of years.

[441] But that's not the issue at the moment.

[442] Now, in Islam, there's a tremendous emphasis on Christ's doctrines as well.

[443] And there isn't any evidence that Christ himself took part in, let's say, wars.

[444] Okay, I disagree with that.

[445] It's hard.

[446] And let me disagree with that.

[447] What do you mean?

[448] Okay, well, if you analyze Christ as an archetype, when he comes back in his second coming, he is going to dominate the world.

[449] And one can say, well, that's not the historical Christ.

[450] But when we're looking at him in the way that you know, Look, that's a reasonable, that's a reasonable objection.

[451] And I understand that a judge has that martial element.

[452] And I don't think it's reasonable to use the archetypal representation as an argument against the historical reality.

[453] And look, I'm not saying to you that I know that what Muhammad did was wrong.

[454] That isn't what I'm saying.

[455] I'm saying that I don't understand how participation in those defensive wars, let's say, But then that was also followed by a tremendous explosion of Islamic expansion, right?

[456] The biggest empire of the world had ever seen in a very short period of time, right at Europe's doors.

[457] And that was also followed by the severance of the Islamic faith into two major categories and internecine conflict there.

[458] And so there's that stream of armed conflict activity.

[459] I think that you're, with respect, I don't think you're getting the history fully right here.

[460] because well yeah that's fine go right ahead the the war in jemal and sufid that the wars between shia and sunnah or what would then be it's not really between shia and sunna because quite frankly shiaism had not been established as a but the the wars of the companions how many people died in those wars do we have any numbers for maximum we can say but it's but it's fair look fair enough man and it's not like it's not christian it's not like christian hasn't been rife with internecine conflict yes no but the thing is But the fact is that it was almost immediately after Muhammad's death that this fracturing took place among the people that were closely allied with him.

[461] And it was a bloody fracturing.

[462] And it isn't obvious that it's been rectified.

[463] How bloody was it?

[464] Well, how bloody does it have to be?

[465] You know, it doesn't take much.

[466] Okay.

[467] Well, Jordan, let's be honest.

[468] Let's be fair.

[469] Let's be fair.

[470] Right?

[471] With the wars that took place 30 to 40 years, and it wasn't immediately after, because you said that in a video, the day he died, that's wrong.

[472] It didn't happen the day he died.

[473] It happened 30 years.

[474] to four years after it happened 30 to 40 years after and how long how how many people how many members of mohammed's immediate family survived during that 30 years my understanding was that most of his immediate family died in armed conflict relatively his immediate family died in his own lifetime yes well i'm not speaking of them but i'm speaking of what happened after he died let's get these facts right because yeah okay look first first fact mohammad uh sallah salam we say sallahslam meaning peace and blessing upon him, all of his children died in his life, okay, except for one.

[475] So most of the members of his immediate family and his wife died, Khadija died, his uncle Abu Talib died, his other uncle Hamza died.

[476] They all died within his lifetime, either due to illness or due to some other some other cause war, for example.

[477] Like one of the defensive was Hamza died.

[478] And by the way, Muhammad forgave his killer.

[479] And that's something which goes against the war law thesis.

[480] Because when he then conquered Mecca when he conquered Mecca he was actually no fighting I'm not sure if you know this it's called Fatah Mecca when he went into and conquered Mecca he didn't fight anybody it was no fighting there were a few people that were exempted but he actually quoted what Joseph quoted to his brothers in the Quran in the Quran which is leta threba alaykumul yom that no blame is on you today and so and this by the way is a bedrock example of forgiveness in Islam because these were people that were persecuting him for 13 years.

[481] These are people that were, that killed his uncle.

[482] Like I said, there's one person called Wahshy, who literally killed his uncle and mutilated his body.

[483] And he said to Wahshy, I forgive you, but I can't see your face because of how, how, he said, munkin to be, and me, wajhak, or a wajha, he said, can you keep your face away from me because I can't, psychologically, I can't be my face, but I do forgive you, he said.

[484] So he forgave people that killed his own family members.

[485] And this was after he himself attempted a treaty with the pagans called Hodebiah.

[486] And so they broke the treaty and that's what initiated the conquest of Mecca, which was not a conquest that was fighting.

[487] Now, if you compare this, because I think the comparison, if there's any comparison that can be or should be made, it's Jesus' second coming with Muhammad in the Medinian period, not in the Meccan period.

[488] In the Meccaean period, both were being persecuted.

[489] Jesus in his life and Muhammad in the Meccan period.

[490] But Jesus, when he comes back, he will then get authority and he will be ruling with the iron sceptre according to the Bible.

[491] He would be crushing his, he will be crushing his enemies, as it says in Corinthians, under his foot, humbling his enemies on his foot and killing and violent stuff.

[492] So in fact, I will actually argue today that the New Testament represents, of Jesus Christ in his second coming is way more violent than Muhammad's conquests in the Medina period.

[493] Okay, well, look, like I said, I wasn't trying to make the case.

[494] I wasn't trying to make the case that what happened in Mecca or Medina was wrong.

[495] So let me explain that a little bit.

[496] So Christian Europe fought a defensive war against the Nazis.

[497] It isn't obvious that that was wrong.

[498] I don't think that was, I wouldn't say that's defensive.

[499] Well, okay, fine.

[500] But I understand the concept of defensive war.

[501] When America got involved in World War II, it was not under immediate threat by Germany.

[502] And it colonized it.

[503] And here's the thing.

[504] It overtook Western Germany, you see.

[505] And here's the thing, the term warlords that you use with the Prophet, you've never used with Harry Truman.

[506] You've never used with Roosevelt.

[507] You've never used with Winston Churchill, all of which conquered countries, literally, in wars.

[508] I feel like there is a bias there.

[509] And you've actually never used it with anybody else, aside from the Prophet Muhammad in your public output.

[510] And I think that's unjustifiable.

[511] I think that you have biblical prophets like Moses, you have biblical prophets, like Joshua.

[512] You have Jesus in his second coming, all of which were warrior prophets.

[513] And you've only used the term warlord with the Prophet Muhammad.

[514] And I think that is unjustifiable.

[515] I think if we'll be, what is it that quote?

[516] What makes someone a warlords in your, in, then if it's, if it's, if it's, if it's conquering lands, then Harry Truman is a warlord, then, uh, you know, and so on and so forth.

[517] In fact, the problem, well, I guess that's a real, that's a real tough question, isn't it?

[518] What makes a warlord and what makes a just war?

[519] It's not like any of us have the precise answers to that.

[520] I think that's what we're partly what we're trying to hash out right here.

[521] The definitions of the word warlords, the definition of the word word load, according to Collins is that someone who acquires force by aggressivity and violence.

[522] Well, okay, so you push back on me, so I'll push back on you to some degree.

[523] Well, it's certainly the case that the expansion of the Islamic Empire was accomplished by a tremendous amount of warlike activity, and that wasn't defensive.

[524] Now, look, I understand that monotheism is a difficult state to attain, and that monotheistic societies have emerged in the midst of conflict throughout human society.

[525] I understand that.

[526] And I'm not even saying that there's something exceptional in that regard about Islam, although the rate at which it happened was quite remarkable.

[527] But it still presents us with a problem, doesn't it?

[528] I mean, everyone, it presents everyone with a problem.

[529] And the problem is, well, for example, the problem is reconciling the idea of turning the other cheek with the idea of a just war, a defensive war, or an expansive war, for that matter.

[530] And of course that issue is relevant to Islam, because Islam exploded outward and produced the biggest empire of the world at every day.

[531] seen in the space of a few short centuries.

[532] So then, so then you ask, well, so then you ask, well, what's the spirit, what is the spirit that animated that?

[533] And is that attributable to the Islamic doctrines themselves?

[534] I don't know the answer to that.

[535] No, let me tell you the answer to that, okay?

[536] And this is what I want to tell you conclusively, and this will help build bridges, honestly, because we can maintain the warlord thesis, we can maintain the expansionist thesis.

[537] But here's what I'll tell you.

[538] Islam has a, has a capability to be expansive and it also has a capability of making peace treaties and it does and it should do whatever's in its best interest just like every country should do whatever is in its best interest in the pre -modern world we did not I think this is highly anachronistic in the pre -modern world there was no such thing as the UN it was a realist international relations framework whereby everybody was fighting everyone the Roman Empire didn't care about what it didn't care about you quite frankly it was expanding itself the persian empire was expanding itself and the and the arabian peninsula was in between both and so it could have either been swallowed by those two other empires or it could decide to in fact we will impose our governments on them before they impose it on us and it decided the former rather than the latter it decided to expand and in fact the prophet in his weakest of times he predicted that that would happen you know there was one war in particular where there were they were starving and it's called chandak and he hit a Iraq and he said, the Roman Empire has been conquered.

[539] He hit another Iraq again, he said, Fortihat Ferris, that the Persian Empire has been conquered.

[540] And then he knocked the rock again.

[541] He said, he said this in his weakest moment.

[542] He said that the Yemen has been conquered.

[543] I see that the expansion of the Islamic Empire is a proof for Islam.

[544] And you know, it's not just me. Even historians say this.

[545] Barnaby Rogerson, he said the fact that Islam spread to the Roman Empire and the Persian Empire is equivalent to the is equivalent to eskimos taken over russia in america i believe it's miraculous if anything that this happened i don't think it's unjustifiable i think actually jordan peterson then why did it stop it why did it stop at europe's borders so to speak if it was a miraculous expression because of uh it wasn't successful there it wasn't it stopped where it couldn't go further but the point is is that it's not like the christians at that time in rome cared I mean, they did the same thing for years.

[546] They were expanding themselves.

[547] Well, that's why I said I wasn't making a prima facie case that this was wrong.

[548] I'm trying to understand it.

[549] And so, and you objected to my use of the term warlord, and perhaps rightly so, you know, perhaps that was an injudicious comment.

[550] I was rather shocked when I was reading Islamic history when I encountered the degree of violence that surrounded these events.

[551] And so, you know, maybe I was in, like I said, I was injudicious in my...

[552] I think that shows real sincerity.

[553] And it's one step closer to creating real, meaningful relationships between.

[554] Well, I think, and I think your, you know, your defense that, well, the world was a battleground of empires.

[555] And, you know, if it's push out from our territory, be encroached upon and dominated, then it isn't obvious that being encroached upon and dominated is the right approach, the correct approach, the most moral approach, let's say, especially because there'd be no shortage of bloodshed that would also accompany that.

[556] so sometimes you're in a bad place but you know it's not an easy thing for any of us to what would you say mediate between doctrines like turn the other cheek and love your enemy and also at the same time discuss the necessity of both defensive and sometimes expansionist wars right we all have to contend with that and and it's very difficult to contend with it the arguments are extremely complicated you're absolutely right and i think what's really important here because I think this is a huge misconception is to outline, because I know you're against totalitarianism.

[557] You're very vocal about that.

[558] And I want to tell you that we are also a point of commonality.

[559] We are also against totalitarianism.

[560] If we define totalitarianism as a central government trying to encroach every private and public matter of the citizens' lives.

[561] And this is something we don't believe in.

[562] In fact, this is very important.

[563] Islam does not say you have to force people.

[564] either to become Muslim, or that they can, or they have to live in Islamic lifestyle within an Islamic governance.

[565] And I'm not sure if you know this, but at the time of the Prophet, he made a constitution, okay, with Jewish people, with other people who are not Muslim at the time, protecting their rights, protecting their rights to worship whoever they wanted to worship, and actually even guaranteeing that if there were intruder forces, that they would be protected like that as well.

[566] Is that the, is that the arrangement made with, like, fellow people of the book, essentially?

[567] Yes, it was arrangement.

[568] Yeah, I'm aware of that.

[569] Yes, and so not only this, but this was implemented at the time of the caliph, so Omar al -Baghatab, or Abu Bakr al -Siddiqu, Ali bin Abid Talib, and so on.

[570] This is, we believe in a kind of pluralism in the sense.

[571] And in fact, I would argue that it was more legally efficacious than what we have in the West.

[572] Do you know why?

[573] Because permission was - Do you think that's true now?

[574] Yes, even, let me tell you why.

[575] Because Christians were given courts that they could rule in, and that the law would be a parallel dissenting law system which would have effect.

[576] So they would effectively be able to go and judge their affairs outside of the general framework of Islam.

[577] And in fact, this is in the Quran.

[578] And they took this, even though we believe that the Torah has been corrupted to some extent, the remnants of, they can use the Torah, whatever corrupted version they have, rule their affairs and this is something that was was was done at the time of the prophet done at the time of the caliphs and so even now we would say and i'm not saying that the whole of islamic history has presented this conventia that we saw in spain between muslims and jews a good time and and or other times was held by all yeah yeah i'm not saying that of course i'm not but what i'm saying is that i think it is disingenuous to to to paint a point at islam as if it's been the most intolerant of all of these religions look at the alham Look at the Spanish Inquisition, look at the Crusades, look at the colonialism that has happened in the name, if not even not in the name of religion.

[579] There's no disputing with me the fact that in some sense we all have the blood of history on our hands.

[580] Yes.

[581] I'm firmly aware of that.

[582] And it's an existential burden for everyone.

[583] And I'm not trying to make the case that this is particularly or uniquely true of Islam.

[584] I certainly know that that's not the case.

[585] what I'm saying instead is that these are things that we have to contend with and we don't exactly know how you still have the problem of these two evangelizing religions that are going head to head in some sense yes it's true evangelizing doesn't mean that it's compelling and this is very clear okay now that's now there's an interesting point not that the points you made before aren't because I kind of think well let he who can tell the best story win and then that story also has the best actors, so to speak, right?

[586] And so I would say the proper mode to conversion is something like shining example.

[587] And then if you're governed by a doctrine that is in fact divine, and you're managing to embody that in the sense that gives you the glow, the charismatic glow of embodied divinity, two steps removed, let's say, and people are willing to abide by your words as a consequence, well, more power to you.

[588] And that's a lot more efficient and effective than compulsory war, armed conflict, or any of those things.

[589] And I mean, this is a constant problem.

[590] And I would also say that given our technological mastery now, we really can't afford this anymore.

[591] We have to solve this problem of defensive war, expansive war, evangelical religion, you know, how to go about uniting us under some umbrella that isn't so vague that it means nothing, how to preserve our traditions from the past.

[592] And I can't see any better way than each of us trying to be shining exemplars of our tradition.

[593] And then letting that goodness shine forth in a way that people, it may be the case that we'll find that the better we are, the more we're like each other.

[594] Wouldn't that be a kind of union under something approximating God?

[595] That all good men could see in each other a reflection of something that was the highest?

[596] And that that could be compelling in and of itself?

[597] Absolutely.

[598] But I think in terms of the jurisprudence, in terms of what Islam is capable of, people in the West must realize that Islam is fully capable of peace.

[599] This is what must be realized.

[600] How do we know that?

[601] It's not despite the Quran and the sunnah or the sayings of the prophet and the actions, but it's because of them.

[602] If you look at the Quran and you look at, for example, chapter 4 verse 90, or if you look at, for example, chapter 1 verse 90, chapter 2 verse 190, you'll see that the Islamic commandments are clearly sometimes about defensiveness.

[603] but sometimes also clearly about creating peace treaties.

[604] And this treaty of Hadebiah is a bedrock example.

[605] So long as there's peace, treaties, there is peace.

[606] And so in terms of Muslim countries, they can perpetually create peace treaties with other people.

[607] Muslim people, even more so, because we believe we're fully under contract.

[608] So you're willing to abide by a contract.

[609] This is the thing.

[610] Let me tell you something, Jordan, Peter.

[611] okay the thing one of the clearest for me and i've done a lot of work studying liberalism studying christianity and studying islam okay this the clearest commonality between liberal theory and is contractarianism and contracts consent that is a clear thing because in in liberal theory you have the theory of consent and in islam you have the same thing contracts are binding the Quran says yeah you all the even with people outside the faith yes especially with people outside the faith.

[612] Why especially?

[613] Why especially?

[614] Is that part of the tradition of hospitality in some sense?

[615] Yes, because if you break a contract with a non -Muslim, then you're driving them away from Islam.

[616] Okay, so...

[617] Yes, that's definitely true.

[618] That's absolutely definitely true.

[619] Islam is, Islam is attempts to attract people to its own religion.

[620] One of the categories of Zakat was, well, al -Mu 'alafati, money that you pay to non -Muslims so that they can feel comfortable and they can feel as if you're doing them a favor and there's relationships going on.

[621] It's a category.

[622] It is a category of Zakat, which is one of the five pillars of Islam, to give such money.

[623] So the fact that Islam states in chapter five verse, verse one, yeah, you who are you who believe fulfill your contracts.

[624] That is generic.

[625] That means to abide by your word.

[626] You have to stick by your words.

[627] No matter.

[628] For us, if you don't stick to your words, then this shows a lack of character.

[629] It shows that you, in fact, one of the signs, one of the signs of a hypocrite is that he goes against, a religious hypocrite.

[630] Is that he either, if he makes a contract, he goes against it.

[631] It seems one of the most despicable things.

[632] Do you think that there are other things that I've said about Islam that we could talk about right now that I could clear.

[633] clear up and, you know, because I don't want elephants under the carpet, I don't like elephants under the carpet or snakes under the carpet.

[634] So are there other things that I've said that you, that people on the Islamic side who would maybe like to not be my enemy, let's say, because who needs enemies after all, unless you want them?

[635] Are there other things that you think, places that I've misstepped in a serious manner that should be rectified as far as you're concerned?

[636] In a serious matter, I will confine it to the warlord comment, because I think that's the one that most Muslims...

[637] Well, you know, people in the West are afraid of Islamic expansionism, and they're...

[638] Okay, so let's go after that again.

[639] So the other thing that I find upsetting, let's say, is the civil war in Islam.

[640] Yeah, well, yeah.

[641] The Prophet didn't tell people to fight each other.

[642] I mean, that...

[643] Fair enough.

[644] Islam doesn't say that Islam doesn't say there should be a civil war.

[645] In fact, it was predicted, but it was never encouraged.

[646] In fact, the Quran clearly encourages against civil war.

[647] Yeah, and I would say the same thing about Christianity and relationship to be endless Protestant and Catholic wars.

[648] Sorry, just to interrupt.

[649] It gives us a remedy.

[650] In fact, the Quran is the only religious book I know that tells you how to deal with the civil war.

[651] And in ta 'afatani from the mommunininin 'a, for uslihanihani, it says that if two groups of Muslims fight, then create peace between them.

[652] So if baghatt ihthahe to behuehattahe it says that if one of the groups rebels against the other group then fight the one that is rebellious until it wakes up to the command of God.

[653] So Islam is categorically against civil war.

[654] Islam is clearly for pluralism.

[655] It's not for compulsion.

[656] These misnomer's and misconceptions exceptions must.

[657] Okay, so, okay, so fair enough.

[658] And as I said, I know that the Protestants and the Catholics were at each other's throats for years.

[659] And despite the fact that of there being no justification for that, let's say, or quite the contrary, in the Gospels.

[660] So this isn't a problem that's unique to Islam, but it is an ongoing problem in Islam.

[661] And it's not like there isn't sectarian strife in the West.

[662] I also understand that.

[663] And so that makes people watching the the religious community say, wary, because, well, for obvious reasons.

[664] And so why do you, I know you can't answer this question in totality, but Islam hasn't been able to bring its own house into unified order.

[665] And so why do you think that is?

[666] And how is that related to Islam itself, if it is at all?

[667] There's nothing exceptional about Islam in that regard.

[668] And this once again, you made this point many times, and I'll tell you something again, just because there's multiple interpretations of something, it doesn't mean.

[669] mean that that thing is false.

[670] Like there may be multiple interpretations of the killing of JFK.

[671] It doesn't mean that JFK didn't get killed.

[672] People differ on things, which, especially if there's a lot of those people, which there can be more than one interpretation about.

[673] Now, in terms of body count, there was actually a book that was written.

[674] And there was a chapter of the book by, I think his name is Nazeer Sheikh.

[675] And he done a study looking at the numbers of people that have been.

[676] killed in all the major world religions and he puts Christianity firmly at the top.

[677] I mean, this doesn't require too much historical research anyway.

[678] Look at the 30 -year war.

[679] Compare that with any war.

[680] Look.

[681] Any war in Islam.

[682] Okay.

[683] Okay.

[684] So the point you're making, the point you're making is twofold is it's not, the necessity for civil war isn't embedded in the doctrine.

[685] And there's no reason to throw stones at the Muslim world when we could perfectly well look to our own history.

[686] And I do think what we should do is look to our own history.

[687] I really believe that.

[688] And I believe that we all carry historical guilt for the bloodshed that's preceded the structure of all of our societies.

[689] But in the West, we look at the Muslim world and we see that it's riven apart.

[690] And we wonder, well, I know there's a hypocritical element to that.

[691] I'm not claiming that there isn't.

[692] It's not like we have our own house in order.

[693] You have to remember something else.

[694] You have to remember there was a colonial reality that existed where Britain, France, and many of the European countries and the Western European extensions, they dominated the Muslim world for the last two, three hundred years.

[695] Yeah, but I don't think that's particularly good argument.

[696] No, it's very good argument.

[697] Well, hang on, hang on a second.

[698] I don't want to knock it away completely.

[699] The RIF that I'm talking about, though, was evident far before that.

[700] Now, the fact of that colonial complication, that could well be, the fact of that colonial complication could well be a contributor.

[701] I know the nation -state lines, first of all, were imposed, they were imposed quickly, they were imposed arbitrarily, and without, and partly that was a consequence of, what would you say, having to do a lot of things very quickly in the aftermath of a terrible war.

[702] I'm not trying to excuse it, but it was complicated, and I know that that's left the Middle East in this, you know, a group of nation states that now comprise the world in a very complicated situation.

[703] So it's a reasonable point.

[704] But the Rift was there before.

[705] And so...

[706] Okay.

[707] Here's what I'll say to that, yeah.

[708] You're right to say that there was arbitrary lines that were drawn, but it's not just that there were arbitrary lines that were drawn.

[709] You mentioned the Middle East.

[710] Syria, for example, which is where most of the problems are happening now, in terms of the Middle East countries, it's probably number one.

[711] Maybe Libya number two.

[712] But say Syria, for example, they put three, four, five, ten different factions, all of which have differing understandings of religion, of ideology, of whatever it may be together.

[713] That produced wars.

[714] You know, you had Christians in Lebanon fighting Sunnis, Shias fighting Sunnis, and this happened, especially after the revolution.

[715] A lot of it is political factors.

[716] So it was the imposition of a false unity.

[717] That's really what happened.

[718] If you look at what they're doing now, like it, look at Lebanon as an example.

[719] You have to have a Christian president and a Sunni prime minister and a Shi 'e, I don't know what it is, first minister or something.

[720] I mean, they have systems that try and mitigate these issues, but it's a mess because you're putting people that have different visions of how to run a country together, and they have similar demographics.

[721] It's like 30%, 40%, 20%, and so that creates more wars.

[722] But they put them together almost on, I would argue on purpose, to be honest.

[723] It's divide and conquer.

[724] If you look at countries like Denmark and Sweden and Norway, which are very peaceful and very prosperous, they're also very homogenous.

[725] And they're relatively small.

[726] So the problem of governance over diversity is much reduced in countries like that.

[727] It's simpler for them to be at peace because the culture is relatively homogeneous.

[728] And so I take your point.

[729] It's not easy to bring a true diversity into something approximating a unity, especially when that unity has been, in some sense, arbitrarily imposed and also rapidly.

[730] and arbitrarily imposed.

[731] So that's a reasonable point.

[732] I think what it is, and I've seen this in your reading list, it's like when you follow kind of Bernard Lewis's or Samuel Huntington's kind of clash of civilization narratives, sometimes you miss the nuances, and these are the nuances.

[733] Yeah, well, that's for sure.

[734] There are myriad contributory factors to why.

[735] And I still don't see how Islamic countries, there's like almost 50 Muslim majority countries, are in general.

[736] like you made a point about economic potential one time you said yeah yeah i wanted to ask you about that because well that's another thing that's quite a mystery is that the comparatively speaking per capita the muslim countries are not that productive economically there's four muslim majority in what sense there's four muslim there are four out of ten muslim majority countries in the gdip per capita top ten brunei katar kawait and saudi arabia well i'm not sure that i'm will to grant the fact that most of that wealth is generated by oil as a indicator of productivity.

[737] The point stands, you said per capita.

[738] Do you think who can be capital?

[739] Sorry, yes, fair enough, and you were right to call me on that.

[740] That isn't what I meant.

[741] I'm sorry.

[742] Because I don't think, well, no, I do.

[743] We've got to get the words right here.

[744] We've got to get them exactly right, because these things matter.

[745] I don't, well, all you know that oil wealth is often a curse, as well as a blessing.

[746] So outside of oil wealth, You have Brunei.

[747] Brunei is another country that's in the top ten.

[748] Okay, so let's talk about Brunei.

[749] What have they done right in your estimation?

[750] I don't know much about Brunei, but I know they're in the top ten.

[751] I have to be honest with you.

[752] Yeah, well, that's part of this low -resolution knowledge that we all have a problem with, right?

[753] I mean, talking about these things is very difficult because you have to know everything to do it right.

[754] It's not that easy to know everything.

[755] I know that they were trying to implement Sharia to a very high level, and whatever they're doing is not because it's not despite the Sharia.

[756] But what I also know is that the methodology is flawed when you look at Muslim -majority countries and say, well, they're not doing well as non -Muslim majority countries.

[757] Because the Ottoman Empire 400 years ago was doing better than most countries in the world.

[758] Yes, yes, absolutely.

[759] And I know, I know.

[760] And historical time frame matters, you know, because it's definitely.

[761] So that's a perfectly valid point.

[762] Let me tell you something, John Pearson.

[763] You are an epistemological pragmatist, from my understanding.

[764] You've said before in an interview that anything which serves life is true.

[765] That's what you've said, I think with Sam Harris.

[766] If this is the case, and you said it's nested in Darwinism.

[767] If this is your position, then the truth of them matter.

[768] Well, it's nested in a very complex manner in Darwinism.

[769] I mean, I think that highest truth is something like love.

[770] And I think it's very much associated with the notions of love that are central to religious traditions.

[771] And so I'm with you, but you still believe that truth is utility.

[772] And you still believe, because that's the pragmat.

[773] position.

[774] And so truth is relative.

[775] What I'm saying to...

[776] Yeah, but I also believe that the basis of utility is love.

[777] I'm not so sure that...

[778] I'm not so sure that you and I differ so much on that particular issue.

[779] John Peterson, what I'm going to say to you is this, First of all, pragmatically, Islam is doing the best, because if you're talking about evolution, then we're talking about reproduction and survivability.

[780] And Islam has got the highest birth rates in the world today.

[781] It's the fastest -grown religion by a mile.

[782] By 2 ,100, it will be number one.

[783] So in your definition, it should be the most true, by the way.

[784] Number one.

[785] Number two is this, is that...

[786] Well, that's a lot of love, all that reproduction.

[787] They'll try and change the subject now.

[788] So number number two is this, Dr. John Peterson, as I'll tell you, that I think...

[789] I've seen your struggle against postmodernism.

[790] I've seen your struggle against nihilism, and I don't think you will be successful.

[791] And I'm sorry to say it like this.

[792] And the reason why I don't think you'll be successful is because your framework is itself relativistic.

[793] If it's utility and epistemologically pragmatic, then truth is relative.

[794] And if truth is relative, what are you going to say to up?

[795] You actually agree with the postmodernist in that sense.

[796] I think you're closer to postmodernist than you think.

[797] In fact, the pragmatist position is not inconsistent.

[798] It's not inconsistent, Jordan Peterson, with the pragmatic position that you hold.

[799] What we are offering you and the list.

[800] Well, I'm going to detail out that in much more detail when I go to Cambridge and Oxford.

[801] So I don't know.

[802] You should come.

[803] why don't you come to one of the talks I'll come okay just send me do you want me to get do you want an invitation I'll get you an invitation well let that why don't you come because I'm going to talk about exactly that one of the things in Islam is to always accept invitations as well and gifts and I'm going to send you some gifts as well my friend dear all right we need to get you some gift all right so look I'm going to ask you one more I got to stop because I'm getting burned out I want to ask you one more question okay and I would like to talk to you again and I do hope you come and join me in Cambridge or at Oxford for one of these talks that would be real good I'll get the person organizing the trip to extend you an invitation.

[804] And so, now you described yourself as a traditionalist as opposed to a liberal Muslim.

[805] And we were talking a little bit about Mustafa Akul.

[806] And so why for you is the traditionalism particularly important?

[807] And why should that carry more weight than, let's say, attempts to hypothetically liberalize Islam?

[808] what is it doing for you look we have and this goes back to the pragmatism point and the postmodernism point Islam gives you moral anchorage in and of itself we believe Islam itself has an inbuilt flexibility but objectively it's an from a correspondence theory perspective it's an outside truth which is which is hard which is strong and which can oppose and destroy postmodernism and nihilism and that's what I think a lot of your followers want to say so you think so you think that a traditionalist grounding is a more it's a firmer foundation as far as you're concerned when a liberal decides that they want to fuse islamic ideas with uh islamic ideas with liberal ideas they're they're almost um they're almost okay fair enough i can understand that and it's partly why i have some sympathy for conservative for the conservative perspective just one point okay yes yes so they're admitting that there's almost an admission that Islam is not complete and it's not perfect.

[809] We believe Islam is complete and it's perfect and it's guidance.

[810] And we believe we have evidence for that.

[811] Whether it's the prophets...

[812] Yeah, well, okay, but there's two problems I have with that, I would say.

[813] I mean, look, and I'm taking your point seriously, and I understand the utility of firm foundations as a bulwark against chaos.

[814] Yes, of course.

[815] But here's two problems I have with that.

[816] It's not easy to protect yourself if you're a traditionalist against the temptation towards an authoritarian interpretation.

[817] and flawed as we all are, you know, when we approach, let's say, sacred texts, we also have to remember that it's us who are reading them.

[818] And divine though they may be, that doesn't mean we're perfect in our receipt of their message.

[819] And so it's hard, the danger on the more traditionalist side is the slide into authoritarian certainty, as opposed to the slide into chaos on the more liberal side.

[820] So how do you personally defend yourself against?

[821] that?

[822] Well, first of all, authoritarianism on pragmatism and pragmatism are not inconsistent because an authoritarian leader can...

[823] I'm not saying I have the answer to that problem.

[824] Okay, fine, fine.

[825] That's the first thing.

[826] Number two is, I would say, do you know, you've said one time I think in a lecture that one of the miracles of Christianity is render onto Caesar verse, you know, render onto Caesar what belongs to Caesar and render on to God what belongs to God.

[827] What if Caesar is Hitler?

[828] Then you've got authoritarianism all over again.

[829] again.

[830] So I think...

[831] Yes, definitely.

[832] Yeah.

[833] So you didn't answer my question, though.

[834] It was a technical question.

[835] It's a technical question.

[836] Look, and maybe I'm wrong in the formulation, and you can tell me if you think I am.

[837] What I see as a danger on the liberal side is the possibility of a descent into something like chaos.

[838] That's hopelessness and despair.

[839] But what I see on the more traditionalist side, let's say the conservative side, is a retreat into a kind of authoritarian certainty.

[840] And that's, those are twin temptations that might be, what would you say, specific to given temperaments?

[841] And I was asking you personally, like, you're a, you're a traditionalist believer.

[842] How do you protect yourself, you know, your soul against the temptations of overweening certainty?

[843] All right.

[844] I got you.

[845] I got you.

[846] Okay.

[847] Yeah, no, no, I don't.

[848] In terms of certainty, I strive for it.

[849] In fact, we want it.

[850] We don't, we don't want to, the problem is not, in my view.

[851] rectify error like you know you're not perfect obviously no no me personally of course I'm not perfect but we believe we follow a perfect guidance right but you follow it imperfectly yes I and there's the rub right so so that's my point is that given that you have to follow it imperfectly given that you're imperfect how do you defend yourself against inappropriate certainty because look if you're imperfect it means you think you're right about things you're not right about that's the definition of it's compounded ignorance right yes yeah yeah so there are things that i you know in terms of my own personal you're talking about my own personal face yeah i'm talking you you bet you're right okay i got you there are certain things which i'll agree i will believe in 100 % and there are certain things i will suspend judgment on so the things which for me constitute the anchor i believe the moment i take the anchor away i plunge into chaos and aliqui and depression and that's not something i'm willing to do for myself.

[852] So the certainty I have is that there's one God worthy of worship, that God's wisdom and guidance is the truth, that whatever God says is true, that the prophets are true, that heaven is true, that hell is true, all that stuff.

[853] The things I will suspend judgment on is how to deal with situations.

[854] Because that, I do believe, by the way, in a kind of Sharia consequentialism.

[855] And I do believe that within the Islamic framework, it's something called Usul al -Faq, which is basically the principles of jurisprudence that rules are not always going to work in all cases we do believe that by the way so for example I'm not allowed to drink alcohol but in certain cases if it's the last thing that one can do if they're not going to die if they're going to die if they don't do it then we can do it and this is just one like extreme example we're not allowed alcohol in Islam obviously this is one of the injunctions but there are things we do believe in a consequence and inbuilt flexibility with that we have to communicate, we have to discuss, we have to speak to Muslims and non -Muslims alike.

[856] Okay, okay.

[857] So I'm still not getting at what I want, I want to hear from you specifically.

[858] You know that, well, all of us struggle with the desire to have what we believe be right at all costs, right?

[859] Because it's, well, it is satisfying and it's difficult to be wrong because it means you have to improve, you have to look at your errors.

[860] I'm asking you personally, like when you're dealing with your wife, when you're dealing with your kids.

[861] You know, how do you know when, how is it that you can protect yourself against being overweening?

[862] Now, this is a good question.

[863] You're going to get me in trouble with this kind of thing right now, you know, this is a good question.

[864] What it is is that, you know, I've been married for like nine years now, you know, and I've had to learn that the hard way.

[865] You know, I've had to learn that the hard way that I protect myself by realizing or know my own vulnerability, my own fallibility, my own weakness, the fact that I don't get everything right.

[866] the fact that there's another perspective that there's something outside of myself which is greater than me yeah well that's okay so that's that's something like you know because a serious discussion can be had about the relationship between humility and love right i mean i think a certain degree of humility is a precondition for love because otherwise you can't take the perspective of the other person like how can you if you don't if you don't think you're wrong and i like i for me and and it's certainly been the case this was useful in my clinical practice and certainly in my marriage, is I'm trying to be as attentive as I can to when I'm wrong.

[867] And that seems to be a reasonable move forward.

[868] And I think that's really good.

[869] That's a good part of your person.

[870] I think that's why a lot of people actually love your work and love you as a person, because you come across as extremely authentic and sincere.

[871] That we don't find that kind of thing in kind of a lot of public discourse.

[872] It's not like it's obvious to me that the Christians have it right and the Jews and the Muslims have it wrong.

[873] and so that's certainly not the case at an individual level.

[874] It's way more complicated than that, way more.

[875] And so we're just not going to go for answers.

[876] If we go for answers like that, we're going to be at each other's throats.

[877] And how about we aren't?

[878] How about we're not?

[879] How about we make peace?

[880] Hey, and so you and I, we had a peaceful conversation, so good for us.

[881] And hooray, and hopefully we'll have some more.

[882] And I would be very much like to see you in Cambridge or Oxford.

[883] And you can listen to my arguments in a more detailed manner.

[884] manner that way, and that might address some of the philosophical concerns that you were raising.

[885] So I'll get an invitation out to you, well, likely today.

[886] And hopefully we'll be able to talk again.

[887] And thank you very much for agreeing to speak with me. I appreciate it.

[888] And for correcting me on my misapprehensions.

[889] Thank you, Dr. Jordan.

[890] And you're most welcome to come and speak on my podcast as well.

[891] And as I said, a lot of traditionalist Muslims really look up to you.

[892] And I think we've actually come quite a long way in being able to build bridges.

[893] To really from my side.

[894] So long as today we have realized that, okay, Islam is a religion not too dissimilar, okay, from the other previous dispensations, as we would see it.

[895] And that there are things, there's a flesh that joins these religions, and also that peace is possible.

[896] Peace is possible.

[897] Well, then let's see if we can be good enough people to actually want peace.

[898] Let's try and see what we can do.

[899] All right, man. We'll see you.

[900] I hope we'll we see each other in the UK.

[901] And I'd like to say hello to all the listeners and watches of this from the Islamic community.

[902] And like, let's see what we can do together, man. Yeah, and you're invited to anything, any mosque, I think, in the UK will have you, because you've already got the presence there.

[903] Just name the mosque and I'll get you an invitation.

[904] Send me a suggestion.

[905] When I can send you this invitation, send me a suggestion.

[906] I don't know if I can do it on this visit, but I'm coming back in, I think, March.

[907] and I'm certainly willing to do it.

[908] Not only willing, eager, and I mean that, I mean eager.

[909] I would love to be welcomed in that manner.

[910] That would be a tremendous privilege as far as I'm concerned.

[911] No, no, I think you will be surprised as to the amount of acceptability that you have in particular in the Muslim community.

[912] Well, hooray for that.

[913] So let's try not to mock it up with foolish words.

[914] We're on.

[915] All right, man. Good talking to you.

[916] Thanks again.

[917] Thanks so much, man. Thank you.