In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, the Most Merciful, the Most Merciful. Insha'Allah, this is the third of our presentations. And we'll take an excursion through history starting with the Mughal invasions, ending up with the dissolution of the Khilafah after the First World War. And the process of Chalal will cover the emergence of the Sufi Sheikhs. That was an important benchmark in Islamic history. We'll go on to the emergence of women, sovereigns in Islam, as to how it happened and why it happened. We'll look at the emergence of the Salafi movement. We'll take a brief look at the events in the motive, because those events have a bearing on how Europe emerged from its dark ages and ultimately came to dominate Asia and Africa, which are the Islamic world. Then the onset of colonialism and what it did to the Islamic world, the fall of the Mughal Empire, we'll take as an example. So that through it we can understand some of the reasons as to why it is the way we are at the present time. Then a brief look at the reformers and then the archetypes that have emerged throughout Islamic history. A vast landscape will be brief, but inshallah to it will make sense of Islamic history. We have not produced a great historian in Islam, Islamic history, since the times of Ibn-i-Haldun, the great Ibn-i-Haldun, who came up with the idea Asadiyya, who governs the rise and fall of civilizations. Basically the thesis of Ibn-i-Haldun is that in the beginning when a new wave comes into a civilization, it is animated by the virtues of the desert or the virtues of the village life, integrity, honesty, courage, drive, and cohesiveness with Tawassa Bilhaw, working together. Then gradually as they settle down, they become accustomed to the easy life of the cities. They lose those virtues. As they lose their virtues, they start to come apart. That was the theory of Ibn-i-Haldun. He said that what holds the civilization together is Asadiyya, namely the relationships between families or tribes. The difficulty with the theory of Ibn-i-Haldun from an Islamic perspective is that Islam is against Asadiyya. All we have to do is to take a look at us here in this audience. People come here from all walks of life, all different parts of the world. The only reason that we are together is because of faith. It is not Asadiyya that brings us together. We are not related by bonds of blood. We are related by bonds of Ashab-u-Lailahil-Allah, Muhammad Rasulullah. That is the driver for Islamic civilization. That is the meaning of us. Indeed, throughout time, humankind is at loss. Except such as those who have certainty of faith and engage in righteous action, righteous deeds and join together for what? Haqq. And I gave a brief quote by yesterday about Haqq. Haqq is a very broad universe. It has multiple facets to it. Haqq means truth. Haqq means justice. Haqq means what you owe and what you own. Haqq means your rights and responsibility. All of these things are in Haqq. And the highest meaning of Haqq is that it is the name of Allah, only He is Haqq. Everything else is relative. So, what we have done in here, what I have tried to do in my books is to advance a new theory for the rise and fall of civilization. That was documented in this book. The Islamic global history, which was published 15 years ago. First in Pakistan, Lahore. It was sold out. Then it was published here in the United States. It's available from Amazon.com, with your interest. There's also much of it. It's on the internet. www.historyofislam.com, which has been visited by more than 1.3 million people around the globe. I would advise you to take a look at it. From the point of view of understanding what is the slight perspective on history. It's not the perspective of 20. It's not the perspective of other people. Then we challenge this in response. Asadir. That is not the Islamic perspective. The Islamic perspective is what is in surat al-Asr. One of the reasons why we fell behind is that we read the Qur'an but we don't understand it. People don't read the Qur'an. But then when they read the Qur'an, they don't understand it. They read it as if it's something that needs to be done. There is barakah that goes with it. But we need to understand every word of the Qur'an is a universe unto itself. Every word of the Qur'an is like a light and lamp. Read it. Honor it. Someone asked me what is the reason we fell behind? It is because we don't understand the Qur'an. Understand it and act upon it. Live it. Because the Qur'an has the answers. A seminar like this ought to have 500 people. And allow me to make a comment in any case. I have been invited to an organization in India on the 20th of December. They are honoring 10 well-known Muslims from all over India. There will be 10,000 people there to hear a seminar like this. Why is it that we have such small audience? Because we don't understand the Qur'an. There is nothing to do with me. Nothing to do with you. I beseech everyone to read the Qur'an, to understand it, to act upon it. That is the answer. That is where we have to look. So what happened to Islamic history in the 13th century was a great calamity. A great, great calamity. We say in this day and age we are under pressure. But just imagine 65 to 70% of the Islamic world overrun. Decimated. 90% of the people, this is not an exaggeration, dead. And I explain to you how is it possible for a meeting force to kill 90% of the people. If you want to understand it, go to New Mexico. Look at the city. There are little small hamlets here and there. So what used to happen was that an invading force comes in. People would huddle together within the confines of a fortress. And the fortress would run. It's all gone. So the Mongols destroyed everything in their sight all the way from Mongolia to Galdad. Dams destroyed. Lebrace burned. Scholars decapitated. Women enslaved. Children disappeared. Burned. Gone. And the Sharia disappeared. And in its place, the Mongol Rasa took its place. But for the countries that were affected, you start with Mongolia, western China, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan up to the river Indus. That was India at the time. Iraq, Syria. Syria means Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Israel, Jordan. All of that was historical Syria up to Jerusalem. And then from the other side, we have the simultaneous invasions of the crusaders. Spain, most of it was lost by the year 1248, except for Granada. So 70% of the Islamic world and the great cities that were the centers of learning disappeared. And you can look up the histories, the life stories of some of the great scholars when they died. You'll find so many of them, their lives ending between 1219 and 1221. And the others, they ran as the Mongol forces invaded, either from what is today, Afghanistan, Central Asia, that area. One of them was Maulana Rumi. His family left the western part of Afghanistan and then went to Istihaan, then to Damascus, and finally ended up in Konya. Why? Because they were fleeing the Mongols as they were advancing from the east. And from the other side, Ibn al-Arabi, who was born in Spain and died in his buried in Damascus. Same reason. So with this calamity, with the scholars gone, with the libraries destroyed, with the mosques disappeared, Islam turned to its soul. Islam turned to what was inside of it. The heart of Islam came to the rescue of Islam. We use the word Sufi. But Sufi is a historical term. It is not in the Quran. It evolved in the following way. The spirituality of Islam was always there. The Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam was the embodiment of Islam, of spirituality. Abu Dhabi al-Fadhu was one of the earliest of so-called Sufis. The word Sufi is historical in origin. There are three or four different explanations of the word Sufi. Explanation number one. It comes from the word saf, meaning cleanse. Namely, the people who have the bent of mind looked for the cleansing of the heart so that the heart becomes a reflector of divine light. They remember the name of Allah SWT through the transformation of the heart. They seek to transform their character so that they become, in turn, good Muslims. That is one meaning of it. The second meaning of it is saf, to stand in line, ashab as-safa. These were people who used to wait for the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. When the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam came out of his house, these people, they would stand in line and they would follow him all the way around. They would call him Ashab As-Safa. And whatever the Prophet did, they did. Whatever he did, they did. And that's how the Sunnah of the Prophet came. You see the difference between the Sunnah and Hadith is the following. Sunnah has to do with what the Prophet did. Hadith is what the Prophet said. This is the difference. Why do people fight over this? Unnecessary. What he said is important. What he did is important. There should be no difference between them. I'll touch upon many important things today. And we have some young people that I hope they'll be your casting nuggets. And then go back and work on them. There's no reason to disagree. What the Prophet said he did when ISIS the Digha, when the Allah Anha was asked, tell us something about the character of the Prophet. She said, he was like the Haram. The embodiment of the Haram. So what he said is important. What he did is important. And what he did not do is also important. So, the third meaning of Sufism, so-called Tasawuf, is that it comes from the word Suf, which means wool. Wool, as it relates to the story of Fatimah al-Zahra. It is said that Hazrat Fatimah al-Zahra would take wool because people those days, in Arabia, it does get cold at night. Those of you who have gone for Hajj and Umrah know this during the winter months. So, she used to knit the robes for the family. And who was the family? Our Prophet, sallallahu alayhi sallam, her husband, and her children. And the Prophet used to wear the Kamali, as we call it. He used to wear the robe made by the hand of Fatimah al-Zahra. And the knitting hand of Fatimah al-Zahra is called Suf, from the word Sufi. So, it is a historical term. And don't get hung up on it. Very important. History is history. The Qur'an is the Qur'an. We should be aware of what is historical and what is the Qur'an. Follow the Qur'an. If you don't like the term Sufi, use the word Tasqiyah. And what do the Sufis do? What did they do at the time? What did they do today? See, one of the first things that the Sufis call it, those who were left behind, these were the people in little small hamlets. Tengiz Khan did not leave this city. Even today, as you approach Samarhan, you'll see in the approaches to Samarhan that were there one time. There is a vast area that is completely destroyed. And the mountains are still there. And the center of Bahara, there is a monument that recently was built during the days of the Soviet Union where 8,000 people were put in there one pit by Tengiz Khan and decimated. You can see the devastation even to this day. In Central Asia, in 1221, when Tengiz Khan had finished destroying the countries that I mentioned, the scholars, Muslim scholars got together with Tengiz Khan and briefed him on the spiritual tenets of Islam.  But the attacks on the Islamic world did not cease. They continued up until 1295 in 1258. Well, that was destroyed. And they developed this competition. Now, global competition between the Christians, the Armenians and the Buddhists for the soul of the Mongols. Central Asia used to be Buddhist. Prior to the coming of Islam, Afghanistan was Buddhist. Central Asia was Buddhist. North India was Buddhist. Not Hindu. It is not commonly known. So, the Latin West and the Church of Constantinople sent emissaries to the great Khan in Karakorum, which was the capital of the Mongol Empire. To form an alliance, joint alliance for what? To extirpate Islam. To remove it from the face of the earth. That's how bad it was. The alliance did take place. And some of the women that were sent from the Constantinople court, one of them was Doga Khatun. She became a wife of the great Khan. And in the battle of Al Angelou in 1262, where the Mongol invasions were stopped on the outskirts of Jerusalem. That's how they survived. 10 miles from Jerusalem. Those of you who worked in that part of the world know that. They were stopped there at the battle of Angelou by the Mongols of Egypt. Had it not been for the victory of the Mongols in 1262, the Mongols with the help of the Armenians and the church of Constantinople might well have extirpated Islam. With the exception of Delhi, Delhi was also a Mamlu kingdom at the time. But Delhi's kingdom was only about 20 years old by the time. Because Delhi had been captured by the Mamluks only in the year 1192. From 1192 to 1223. About 30 years. They were trying to settle down. In any case, the Sufis put up a fight. A spiritual fight for the soul of the Mongol. And it was a period of back and forth. Some of these Mongol or lords, sometimes they would become Christian, sometimes they would be Buddhist, sometimes they would be Muslim. Until finally in the year 1296, because of the great Appertia, who was the grandson of Kengiz Khan, accepted Islam. There was the tide of the turn. The tide turned in favor of Islam. And Central Asia, Afghanistan, Iran, Iran remained Muslim. And the history of the world moved on. That was the contribution of the Sufi sheikhs in the 13th century. Again, you have to ask yourself, Allah SWT has his way of dictating history. I will give you for young people a nugget. Remember this. People get involved with debates about Khada and Khadr. Predestination versus free will. Here is a nugget for you. Both free destination and free will are valid. Except that there are different planes. Free will is valid in space-time. But the Billah, operates at a different level of energy. Much higher level of energy which looks down upon the space-time. It is like, for instance, to do an analogy. You take a three-dimensional building. You take the projection, the shadow of the building upon the Earth. You cannot say anything about the depth of the building from the shadow. The depth of the building. Allah SWT will operate at a different level in the plane, ad-Dahar. Whereas the will of man operates at al-Asf. It is a different plane. So, the will of Allah SWT operates through history. If you look back, leading up to the invasions of the Mongols, you will find how Allah SWT prepared the Islamic for all of the invasions. You find it on the state of history. Starting with the period of Abu-Dar. You know, how the was even before that, because he was the doorway to the knowledge of the Prophet, the source of what we call Sufi knowledge. And throughout the classical period of Islam, you had the appearance of the people who were of a spiritual background. Allah SWT gave an honorable place for Tasaww in the in the in the scheme of knowledge of Sunni Islam. You had the appearance of Sayyidin Abdul Khadir Jilani of Baghdad who passed away in the year 1186. This is before the Mongolia. You have the appearance of Turkey. Valar Rumi that was 1173. He passed away in the year 1273 I should say. Imam Shaduli of Egypt, 1258 and so on. So you have a galaxy of these great Muslims of the spiritual mind appearing on the stage of his place Allah SWT is preparing the world of Islam to give it the life raft. As he gave the life raft to Noah he gave the life raft historical life raft to the Muslims and you have the appearance of these great ships. So they carried the day converted the Mongols and the history of the world moved on. Then what happened was for about 200 years in Central Asia you have a period of turbulence a great period of unsettled conditions and in these unsettled conditions you have the appearance of Timur also. Timur was not a Mongol. He was a Tartar and the Mongol invasions were followed by the invasions. Timur was probably a a greater conqueror in a sense that even Mongols and the King's Khan Timur was the one who conquered Russia all of Russia. He was he can be called the father of Russia as a different issue I won't go into it now he conquered Iran, he conquered India, he conquered Egypt he conquered the Ottoman Empire and he was on his way to conquering China when he died in the year 1406 in this period of 200 years you find a great spiritual conversion in the Middle East all the way from Afghanistan to Turkey and out of these spiritual conversions emerged the three dynasties that we are familiar with the Ottomans to the west the Samovites in Iran and the Mongols in India all of them are this conversion even the founding of the state of Hyderabad in the year 1496 if my memory serves me right Khuli Muhammad Khuli Shah he came from that part of the world out of this conversion the spiritual conversions that were going on he one of the Kara Khulish and he left the area between Anatolia and Iran and he came to Hyderabad founded the city of Hyderabad and here you are, beautiful city that's the origin that's what happened now let's take a look a little bit about the Mughal Empire it is very important to understand what happened in the Mughal Empire because we thought it will not understand the origin of colonialism it is the key to the world arises from the happenings in the Mughal Empire summarily the fall of Granada in 1492 freed the Latin West from the challenge of the Muslims the Latin West in turn embarked on the conquest of North Africa and Western Africa established these so-called trading posts and each time they established trading posts they would take some prisoners as slaves these were Muslims and take them to Lisbon and sell the Portuguese and the Spaniards did the same thing the first capture of African slaves was done in year 1426 of a Muslim family in the area south of Morocco which is Mauritania 1426 by the year 1492 there were 10,000 Muslim slaves in Lisbon and in the initial ships that came to America there were so many Muslim prisoners and if you look at the names of the early arrivals on the ships from Spain you'll find Muslim names in there in a minute those names are available in the chronicles in New Mexico to look them up so the Latin West as they embarked on the conquest of North Africa they ran into resistance and they developed a tug of war between the Latin West the northern countries of Europe and North Africa what was the tug of war about after 1492 the Spaniards came to the New World you know the story of the New World the Mayans, the Aztecs the gold and the silver how the Spaniards came here looted it raped and murdered and got rid of all the people of the New World this gold was transported aboard ships to the New World huge amount of gold the value of the currency depends on the amount of gold that it has up until 1974 when they abandoned the gold standard the value of the currency depended upon what backed it up and we have bankers in here they'll only tell you that if there's nothing to back up a currency it's worth the piece of paper that is written on so as this gold was transported from the New World to Spain other countries France, England Morocco, they said there are these ships and they're carrying all this gold now we can attack them as pirates off the coast of Africa and capture some of the gold so the British became pirates the French became pirates and the Moroccans also became pirates and some of the biggest names like Piri Reis, Drake and so on that we're going to hear about in history emerged from these pirates the bay ladies ships the Spanish ships off the coast of Africa take the gold capture it to their own countries a few words about England that's very important why England? England was even more feudal than continental Europe up until the 14th and the 15th century England depended upon gold and there social structure rested upon land they had huge landowners and in between two landholdings they would have a common grazing area and the serfs for the big landholders grazed their goats in the common area and as the demand for goods increased to infusion many of these people left their grazing areas and congregated into the big cities of London and Liverpool and so on so much so in the 16th century for a while the British parliament even passed a law saying that no serf will be allowed in the city of London they had all kinds of very harsh punishments at one point they threatened them with even death in any case these serfs came to the big cities Liverpool and London where there was an opportunity to become pirates so England emerged out of its feudalism through piracy capturing the gold and silver from the new world and as they captured more and more gold they became even more bold ultimately they started to dream about trading with the Indian Ocean areas so out of this tug of war between the countries of North Africa and Europe the bottom line is here is what happened towards the end towards the end of the 16th century this is after Spain has consolidated its hold on the new world and it has consolidated its hold on the Philippines the British under Elizabeth I put up resistance and then Europe became protested I'm sort of summarizing the history of Europe I've written a great deal about it in the books here towards the end of the 16th century three major events happened that again determined the history of the world the first thing there was an invasion of Morocco from Portugal in 1578 a battle of three kings in which the Moroccans were victorious had the Portuguese being victorious at that battle then North Africa would have gone the route of Andalus it would have been lost to the Islamic world and again the result would have been similar to what the Mongols were trying to achieve indeed in 1507 the Portuguese wrote to the Manglo Khalifa in Cairo saying that the intent was to invade Maca and Madina and to destroy the Kaaba this is 1507 so they lost that battle secondly in 1588 the Spaniards invaded England with the Spanish armada you know the result of that they lost it they lost the armada ten years later and this armada was caught in a storm so the gods were devouring England at that time and so England emerged England remained unscathed the end result towards the end of the 16th century is the relative decline of the latin powers and the rise of the northern european powers then there is a gist, a tug of war between the dutch and the english and for historical reasons the english triumphed out in the indian ocean area similar there was a tug of war between the portuguese and the ottoman empire what happened in the indian ocean was the following the muslims controlled the indian ocean the indian ocean all the way from china to the coast of africa was an arabic lake arabic language was the limba franca of the entire area 70% of the gdp in the world was focused, concentrated in the literal states of the indian ocean china india iran, arabia east africa there were prosperous trading centers and it was a gentleman's agreement the trading centers were open in which all the peoples of the literal states could participate and trade and prosper muslims, buddhists, hindus believers, undelivers all of them participated in the trade but for arabic was the limba franca and in order to accommodate the preponderance of arabic influence even the mighty empire of china felt it compelled to send their ships into the indian ocean under the general ship of muslim sailors the great general ho in the year 1410 he traveled from china all the way through the states of malacca near singapur today to the bay of bengal south of india and then through the arabian sea to west africa around the cape of good hope to the southern portion of africa at the head of ships which were 50 times larger than anything that europe could feel at the time that's how preponderance the influence of islam was in the literal states the portuguese learned africa to india through the work of muslim mariners the name of muslim mariners who helped wasgar agama was ahmed ibn majid a man, a gujarati man who lived in africa who was a mariner he had a compass, he understood where the reefs were, how to go from the area that is today zanzibar to the coast of karamandal which is the southern portion of india as soon as they discovered the path to india they became pirates once again wasgar agama returned the first trip that he made was 1496 the second one was 1506 at the head of a flotilla of gun loaded ships and blasted all of this trading centers all the way from shawfala in africa to adan and the ports of persia to the ports of india and in the states of malacca in china destroyed them and took over the trade so that later in the 16th century there was a tug of war between the Ottomans who captured Egypt in year 1517 and they became responsible for protecting the muslim enclaves in asia they put a persistence again to make the long story short the tug of war went on it was like a world war that was fought in north africa spain mediterranean east africa of the coast of china of the coast of buzra all the way it was fought up until the year 1588 the tug of war went on in 1588 there emerged a stalemate the area north of zanzibar stayed in the hands of the Ottomans and the area south of zanzibar stayed in the hands of the portugese and so we have a situation now africa controlled by portugal and spain asia more or less controlled by the muslim dynasties and out of this political situation emerged the slave trade only a few words about the slave trade it was amazing what started as a religious confrontation between europe and the islamic world ended up in the slavery of an entire continent after 1492 as the spaniards colonized the new world they brought in some of the crops of the old world into the new world sugar cane was one of them it was highly profitable they found that the natives here the people of the new the new world so called the native indians the original people of this part of the world they were unsuited for work in the sugar plantations and therefore they wanted to bring in people from africa who they thought were more suited to work in the plantations out of sugar when you process sugar you get rum and out of rum you get the liquor so what happened was there was a three-way trade sugar, rum and from England and spain and portugal they would take these guns and some of the manufactured goods and the rum they go to Africa, give the Africans gun and liquor and let them fight amongst themselves so that they would bring in more slaves and slaves slaves, sugar, rum guns three-way trade and out of this they grew enormously rich out of the gold and silver of the new world simultaneously they trade from the east from India and Indonesia also made them rich why did the Europeans want to go to India because in the year 1700 India accounted for 25% of the GDP of the world when I use the word India I'm talking about the entire area from Kabul to Dhaka and from Kashmir all the way to Mysore that was the Molo Empire most of Afghanistan was a part of the Molo Empire except for the area of southern Afghanistan around Hondahar around the area of Hondahar except Concord captured from the Great Mughals after the death of Akbar so India accounted for 25% of the GDP of the world it exported the black pepper the Indian black pepper from the Colorado course which is the southern part of India was very popular in Europe it brought very high value it was better than the from Africa so they came to India for two reasons one to get the spices and second for the wealth the wealth of India was well known in Europe but they were so ignorant these people the Portuguese for instance did not have the biggest idea as to where India was they assumed that the river Nile somehow flew all the way to India and they called southern India a major, northern India, India minor and they thought there was a Christian king somewhere in Africa his name was Presto John who was waiting for the Europeans to come in and they would form an alliance with them so that they could go and invade the Kaaba and destroy it and they also had to believe that the the body of Prophet Muhammad was hung somewhere between the heavens and the earth above Kaaba of the Muslim world and their intent was very simple that's the extirpate Islam my dear young brothers you'll think that what is happening in the world today is new wake up, read history get to know it, this is not new this has been going on for a thousand years it comes in different forms in different shapes so towards the end of the 16th century you have the emergence of Europe now comes another institution that was to transform the shape of the world the joint stock company do not underestimate the power of the joint stock company what happened was that Spain and Portugal had monopoly on trade slave trade as well as trade the new world and most of the money all of the money went to the kings the English they had more common sense they opened up the trade anybody can pull in the resource of course the rich and even queen Elizabeth I sometimes invested in it anybody can invest in it and profit from the trade that they had with the new world or with India or the Far East the joint stock company enabled Europe to pull resources together so that common people working together can achieve uncommon results working together when all of us work together we can achieve uncommon results do Muslims work together just look at the world today ask yourself why you put four Muslims together in a room to come up with five parties why is that so and then we feel Allah has a special place for us in heaven but how about this earth why don't you read the Quran and follow it what the law says what is just no the joint stock company was a step in the right direction, civilizational direction it enabled Europe to pull its resources together so that then through those resources they could trade and ultimately project their social and political power into Asia and Africa it took them a hundred years but at the same time now we come back to Asia a little bit while Europe is going through this transition the conflicts in the moderate which will resolve with the stalemate between North Africa and the Latin West and then the rise of England the rise of the joint stock company what is happening in the east we have the mobile empire the south of the empire and the Ottoman empire these empires were great on land let us not underestimate their contributions the mobile empire for instance Babur invented a bow an arrow made of composite materials and those of you who don't know what composite materials are these are space materials for instance when I worked on the Hubble Space Telescope I was one of the principle designers of Hubble we use composite materials one of the properties of composite materials is that you can store energy in them you can take care of a lot of compression a lot of tension on this compression they are very good he had a bow and arrow which enabled him to reach out targets much farther than the English bow that people talk about in history and it would be fired very rapidly they invented the matchlock made of composite materials too the matchlock gun was known in Europe also but the matchlock of the models was longer and was made of super plastic material what's the big deal about it a super plastic material has much greater resilience greater strength and you have a longer bow so you have a longer time for the gunpowder to spend its energy in the barrel so that the projectile whether it's a stone or whatever it is has a longer distance to travel 300 yards like a sharp shooter this was mobile empire this was your empire and I have spoken about the rockets up until the 18th century the guns the mobile guns were famous and they were mobile people talk about mobile artillery these days they would carry them from place to place the same thing was true of the Ottomans and the Suphomots but the models this is something that we know about so these empires were great on land but there were two areas which they neglected one printing press the printing press made its appearance in Europe in the 15th century Europe especially after the Protestant Reformation all of the great ideas thanks to the printing press were disseminated to the general population the printing press was not introduced into the Ottoman Empire until the year 1728 it was not introduced into India this mobile India I'm talking about I say India I mean all of South Asia until the year 1815 or thereabouts why was that so and this is something the questions that are constantly asked what went wrong it's not one thing many things went wrong I'm just talking about technology and I'll come back to some other issues in a minute printing press the Ulama were opposed to it they said we're not going to allow the Word of God to come into contact with wood or steel the real reason was that there was a lot of money in it there were condoms there were many people who wrote by the hand the mighty empire that he was empire that he was 25% of the GDP he commanded greater than the amount of relative wealth commanded by the United States of America the end of Second World War that's how rich and powerful he was he wrote books with his own hand he did not bring in the printing press why ask yourself printing press fell behind and therefore the knowledge that was available from outside did not find its way into the Islamic world second reason naval technology that's also a very highly specialized subject it is not that easy it's not just a question of taking a gun and putting it on a boat it's not that simple gunpowder when stored in a very salty environment goes fizzle fizzle itself it has to be packed properly you have to put sawdust or some of the material in it so that it does not absorb water the Europeans mastered the technology the technology was not available in India or the Ottoman Empire so much so that the mighty Mughal Empire to send Haji's from India to Arabia to get the passports of the people the travel documents of the people stamped by the Portuguese with an image of Issa a.s. and Hazrat Mariam a.s. this is how bad it was why did they neglect naval technology this is something that needs to be understood the budget of the Ottoman Empire tells another story in 1900 if you look at the line items of the budget of the Ottoman Empire the amount of budget that the Ottomans had for the navy was the same as the budget that they had for the royal kitchens this is the second reason technology why there are many reasons for it one was smugness which also is characteristic of us today smugness meaning we are the best we have nothing to learn from anybody there is a good place for us reserved for us in heaven it is there nobody else is going to find its way in there smugness you can read about it again and again Emperor Shah Jahan at one time made the following statement he said the Franks anybody from England and Europe was called a Frank the Franks he said would be a great people they are heathens they don't believe as we do secondly they eat pigs and thirdly they don't wash after they go to the bathroom this is the emperor talking about it and in 1728 when there was an understanding between France and Germany up until the time France was an ally of the Ottoman Empire the Khalifa of Istanbul he wrote back and said well when two dogs talk to each other should we be talking to them this was the kind of smugness that they had we have nothing to learn from anybody else the same kind of attitude that pervades the Muslims even today the same kind of attitude kept the Muslims back in the 19th century the sasa at Ahmad Khan fought and when he fought if you go to that part of India you'll find out they called him a kafir they called him I mean they had smugness but for the second reason but the most important reason was the breakdown of morals let's trace our history from the time of the so-called Sufis till the arrival of the Europeans towards the end of the 18th century Islamic civilization takes a turn again I submitted to you that one way to understand history is to take a look at big bends you're not going to find this material in any textbooks no lecturer is going to give you this material this is the result of 50 years of research look for the bends in Islamic history the battle of Dibroogar in the year 1656 between Darashiko and Aurangzeb was a benchmark in world history it was then through that battle that Islamic civilization took its turn from this basis on what it was upon the time namely the heart to the mind I'm not going to use the word Sufi and Salafi it went from the heart to the mind Aurangzeb I and Aurangzeb went out on his own way he was a great man I'm not going to detract from his greatness a great man in his own right he did many great things built up India into a superpower but it was a detour a detour of civilization so Islamic civilization now has its focus on the mind which means the open observations of religion it is at this time you have the appearance of sheikh Abdullah in Arabia about the same time when you look at history you'll find broad scopes there's something greater about world history than what we understand the scopes it says it moves these winds from one side to the other the same thing was happening in Safa-e-Diram and Aram and Turkey about the same time the move to the right if you call it so that by the end of the 17th century by the year 1700 all three of these mighty empires were dictated to by right-wing olama had made its turn to the right it was this Islam focused on the observations of the external but bereft of the energy of the joint stock company or any other means of pooling resources together that came into conflict with the european west and in this conflict it was found wanting it lost out because there was no mechanism the mobile empires revenues upon agriculture and the king gave favors joggers and monsofs Kabul was a jogger and Agra was a jogger and the Marathas got joggers and the monsofs when there was no more land to give there was nothing to give there was no trade for the europeans there was no technology there was no printing press where were the ideas there were great craftsmen I mentioned the bow I mentioned the long barrel gun there were craftsmen there were not scientists and engineers even the rockets of Mysore if you look at them they knew how to make them but they didn't have the theory Isaac Newton or since then anybody else except for a few there are some great ones I'm talking in general terms what I'm trying to say is that Islam took a turn to the right when Europe especially northern Europe was brimming with energy the energy of trade the energy of the joint stock company the energy of pooling resources together and with no hangups in terms of religion because Protestant Europe did not obey the Pope of Rome because fixed upon making money and world domination they embarked upon it and the 18th century you know the rest of the story India was the first great non-western civilization to fall to the west Africa Africa was 100 years later and with the resources of India especially the fall of Bengal in 1757 in 1757 the British took out roughly 3 billion dollars in three ship loads through life and the following year the industrial revolution in England began was it a coincidence? No for science you need capital the capital came from two sources one the slave trade and the loot from India and then of course there was loot for Indonesia too but primarily the India 1757, 1758 between 1757 and 1799 the mice were fell England and Europe you see this resurgence of inventions the wealth of India Bengal Bihar Delhi all these areas ultimately the fall of mice were the wealth, the loot from these areas finance the industrial revolution of Europe and of course the loot from the New World too so India became poor and Europe went on its own to ascendancy what was the response of the Muslims to all of this that we coiled if you look at the history of India which we are thoroughly familiar that we coiled they said how could these people over take us and become our rulers and after 1857 when there was the uprising for a long time the olama said they have nothing to learn from these people let's not even learn the English language let's not learn their science and they were opposed even to the people who wanted to learn the science and the ways of the Europeans it took a long time for our olama to come around to it the olama have to change if Islam has to change the olama have to change we have to teach them not just the Quran and the sunnah and the prophet we also teach them science and history and something about the nature of man that's where change comes from because they have a responsibility they have the authority they are the guides they have to learn they must change that is where the change must begin from or alternately every man, woman and child must study the Quran every man, woman and child they must understand the Quran and then when we have educated people when they get together they will have tabas of it that becomes easy to build a society that is based upon the Quran a society that is based upon the truth from Allah SWT very important so they recoiled and then came the reformers you have the appearance most of whose names you are familiar with in India, Egypt in Afghanistan Abdul Iqbal all of these came with some knowledge of the west most of them were trained in the west and a response to western civilization came about from these sources not from our traditional olama but from the people who had gone to the west studied them, came back and they said let's now go back and revisit and try to reform Islam but the difficulty with reform reform does not work what works is renewal reform does not work what works is renewal you must renew your faith a renewal based upon faith a renewal based upon righteous action upon justice a renewal based upon working together not fighting together we are very good at that but working together a renewal based upon working together for what for justice for the truth truth meaning a scientist looks for truth in his way a philosopher looks for truth in his way philosophy and science there is no question about it ever since then there has been an anti-intellectual stream in Islam when the Muslims get together how many Muslims discuss what to do in the area of science how many of them discuss what to do in the area of changing history they do discuss what to do in the area of religion we are so bogged down with nitty gritty whether or not I should paint my nails we are very good at that splitting it the Quran is so white, so broad has given us the Quran it talks about nature the history of the prophets talks about you and I talks about the minds talks about how we relate to the spirituality we don't listen to it we are bogged down with hair splitting talks about things that are not there in the Quran so renewal is what is needed and this renewal must be based on faith this renewal must be based on the Quran a few words about the position of women and that's the last portion of our presentation today you cannot transform a society with half of the society out somewhere else men and women according to the Quran are equal participants in the moral well-being of men they complement each other the prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam created a society in which men and women could aspire to the fulfillment of their moral obligations before allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam then came the period of the sahaba and the fulfillment flowering of islamic civilization at the time of umar farooq radiallahu at the time of umar farooq radiallahu women went to the masjid how do we know that there are ahadis related to umar radiallahu they used to pray behind the men always observing the aadab of islam not violating the aadab always observing the aadab of islam but the spiritual space was not denied to them women were participants in the economic life of the country we know how hasat hadija was a great tradesperson at the time of umar farooq there were so many women who visit the marketplace that he appointed the lady her name was hasat safah ibn abdullah safah ibn abdullah as the manager of the marketplace in madina looking up in history books hasat umar radiallahu anha what a great man he was just he used to sleep with the doors to his house open anybody could come in i mean can you imagine today a king sleeping with the door open to his house he used to walk around at night he used to say you know i wish my mother had not given me birth because this tremendous load that Allah swt has put on my shoulders because i have to be just umar farooq the title farooq was given to him by the prophet swt it comes from the word farooq that is the criterion to distinguish right from wrong because he was a man of justice justice for women and justice for men and later women are great scholars if you read the travels of ibn abdullah you find that he stayed and learned from so many great women scholars one of them in demascus her name was sitta zahidah is written in his rahla and then all the way even in india when he came there in 1336 what happened was this the first blow came with the harijaits the khawal king harijaits the harijaits i went over briefly the other day walked away from hazzal alir and then they took an oath that the women assassinate hazzal ali hazzal hazzal muwaghia and umar bin alas all three of them they were successful in assassinating hazzal ali but the other two escaped so after that muwaghia got himself a bodyguard all trace for you the history of how women slowly but surely were excluded from religious, social and other spaces the first blow came from the harijaits so he got himself a bodyguard and up until that point the Khalifa used to lead the prayer and muwaghia stopped leading the prayer he got himself a bodyguard then came the time of the abbasids and the persian influence came to dominate the persians persian empire was a persian empire and the courts of the abbasids were known for their pleasantries and the olama said this is not good we have to protect our women they said let's put some more restrictions let's protect our women so there was some more of a distance placed between women and their participation in the religious and the social space this went down for quite a while and I covered the mongolian nations the mongols destroyed and they enslaved women so the olama said we are going to protect our women let's put them, put a greater distance let's protect our women keep them away from the prime eyes of the enemy but there was another thing that happened with the onset of the so-called sufi period the arrival of the turks the indians, the africans and the indians into the fold of Islam up until the mongol period it was the core part of the islamic world arab world eastern turkey and iran and central asia the pro muslim and afghanistan but after the mongol period you have the infusion of hindu blood and african blood and turkish blood and indonesian blood and out of the turks and the indonesians you find many queens the turks, the turkish women participated with the men in war they were co-equals with their men, their culture was different they were not exposed to the early history of Islam so that you have in the 14th century queen rizya of india rizya ruled northern india from 1236 to 1440 an area extending all the way from vandal to kabo and in the following century there was a succession of five queens in indonesia who ruled but half of the other and only about ten years after rizya there was rizya in dor don't pronounce it correctly in egypt she was the ruler of egypt for three years but mostly the mauluks the turks, the africans and the indians it anointed when he saw how easy it was for african women to go in front of the sheikh and discuss with them issues that were concerned to them but this thing changed and then later as the islamic world took its turn towards the salafi movement the duos and the domes were imposed with greater rigor and then there was the interlude of the european invasions and colonization discontinuity so the gradually surely but surely women have been moved away from the religious first and the social and other spheres so again there, what we need to do is to go back to the purity of the Quran the purity of prophet muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam the purity of the sahabah and in the Quran is the ultimate solace, ultimate solution to the issues that we are seeing you know this is the end of my presentation I would be happy to listen to him and learn from you know those who are the earliest muslims the word salaf means the earliest ones who came before us is considered the father of salafi movement it's just a historical religious discussion it's a historical discussion in the time i have felt one of the reasons why the muslims lost out in their competition with the mongols was because they had gone away from the precepts of Islam he was opposed to for instance the sallallahu alaihi wa sallam which had to do with the teachings of the heart in the 18th century the rise of the salafi movement was similarly due to the feeling on the part of the olama that the muslims were falling behind because they were getting away from the pure teachings of the Quran and the sunnah of the prophet but in the process of doing so they put emphasis on the external observations strict external observations of the sharia the arab world since it had not encountered the invasions, mongol invasions except for iraq was much more open to that thinking than was the eastern part of the islamic world but nonetheless the salafi movement puts emphasis on strict observance of the sharia literal interpretation of the sharia not the spiritual interpretation of the sharia and the go too far in negating the lessons of history for instance the demolition of graves the demolition of tombs the demolition of ancient monuments and not recognizing the contributions that were made by other schools of thought they go too far so the salafi meaning as they portrayed the way Islam was understood by the earliest muslims from their point of view then the other schools of thought took the opposite point of view they look at the period they see spirituality there where the salafis say well no this is the way they see it so it is a question of taking a colored glass if you would the salafis and the sufis and this and that and so on each one of them has a colored glass and they put it in there and they say this is the way the world is or as far as we talk about glasses it's all of the above so the salafis need to come back towards spirituality as the spiritual people need to somehow get rid of some of the excesses that they have accumulated Could you also expand on the development of Wahhabism? Wahhabism is a part of the salafi movement it comes from Sheykh Abdul Wahab of Najab he was born in the interior of Arabia I have written about him in the book there is an entire chapter about him basically the story was this he was a scholar he studied the Quran and the Hadith and he came to the conclusion that people were getting away from the pristine purity of Islam so he preached and his initial preachings were not popular people changed him out ultimately he came to the court of the Mas'ul in Najab at the time and through intermarriage the court of the Mas'ul got convinced of what the Sheykh was teaching and the combination of Sheykh Abdul Wahab and the court of the Mas'ul was a powerful combination then they started to preach and expand out not only that they waged war against Muslims this is the other thing about salafism not only that they say that the other position is wrong they waged war on them they think that violence is justified to somehow impose their views on other people so they waged war on the neighboring sheikhs in the kingdoms they came into conflict with the Ottoman Empire back and forth up until the first world war with the help of the British they conquered Hejaz Bakkan Malina and made muhabism a part of the Arabic culture he finished with the culture that they had and they tried to impose it and they still tried to impose it in multiple ways our point does something in here that is the problem with some of the things that they teach I was talking to a scholar who was trained at the University of Madinah he is an Imam in a local area and he said to me when he was trained 30 years ago whenever it was it was prohibited to take any pictures but today he said he went to Madinah for a visit and he saw that everybody there every student has a selfie a camera so you see technology is changing but why take a position and call it Haram one day and on the day it becomes halal the same way with destroying the historical evidences leveling up the tombs leave them alone and imposing their will and other people by means of violence that is not acceptable this is part of their the history but they are changing and in shalom they are changing it does the things that they value because it contradicts the Quran does that make their ideology invalid I don't know that's a loaded question something that people will give up to us they can take a position all I can do is to relate to you from a strong perspective this is what happened you are a young man you will have to my advice to you is this don't get into the corner of this is halal this is not valid just say this is what happened and stand at that because truth stands on its own merits it's when you say that's when the argument starts this is what happens you can discuss with other people take a look at historical occurrences and then people will make up their own mind they will say this is right and this is wrong that's my good advice to you could you go back to you mentioned British yes Britain controlled India after the first world war all the routes to India that's why they controlled Palestine and Iraq because they wanted to have a land route from the Mediterranean through Palestine and Iraq to India so the British were very much involved with the politics of the remnants of the Ottoman Empire and they wanted to make sure that their people were in control of Ijad first it was Sharif Hussein and Sharif Hussein when he proved to be not so malleable they replaced him in 1924 with the Saudi Emirate Britain was the queen of the world up until the second world war and they could do almost anything that they wanted to do especially in that part of so in one hand they were helping Mohor British? in the other hand they were helping the Mohoran Empire the Mohoran Empire disintegrated long before the British appeared Mohoran Empire disintegrated into local Nawabs on paper he failed his service to the sovereignty of Delhi but in practice he was independent


Hello there everyone, my name is Melissa Armell and I own a company called the Stock Swoosh. And I'm doing an upcoming webinar this week about what to do in a bullish market. This is a great topic because we've, gosh, we've been in a bullish market since 2009, 2010, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. We've been in a bullish market for a long time. And I know people think that we're, we've hit the top, but we have barely begun. And so I'm going to talk about this in the live webinar. If you'd like more information, you can email me at Melissa at thestockswoosh.com. Or feel free to go to any one of these social media sites and follow me. The webinar is Thursday, May 4th at 4.30 Eastern time. There's no pass or required. All you have to do is go to the trading room, sign in, be there before 4.30. So do you want to make money in a bullish market? Yes. And, you know, the interesting thing is that I have focused on shorting, but as a result of becoming an expert in shorting, I've been able to read what stocks are doing in a bullish direction, which is very, very beneficial. So the answer is yes, of course you want to make money in a bullish market. You want to make money in any market, but there is a lot of opportunity for you to make money in a bullish market for your long-term investments, your 401k, swing trades, option trades, many, many things. Here is the chart from today. Today is Tuesday, May 2nd, and the market had a tiny, tiny, tiny little red bar, which doesn't look like much. But I'm just showing you here how the market, and I say the market, I'm looking at the QQQs, has gapped up, up, neutral, up, up, up, and up. The market has gapped up almost every day for the last six consecutive days, with the exception of one day where it was neutral. That's bullish people, and you can see the lift since the beginning of the calendar year from January. Here's the opening of 2017. So we'll talk all about this. And wait a minute, I'm just going to back on the same one thing here. Do you see there's no major, there's no big green bars here. I just, I just thought I'd make note of this. There's no huge, big, green, solid bars here. We're just making a nice, consecutive rally buying hire. Anyways, I just thought I'd tell you that. Anyways, here's the chart of Netflix. Beautiful bullish chart. Amazing. I called this the other week here for the option trade. Gapped up here, ran up. I said it will continue. That's exactly what it did. The buying came in. This looks great. Really, really, really strong chart in Netflix here as well. We'll talk about that in the webinar. So if you're interested in more information, come. It's May 4th. We're going to talk about how to trade and make money in a bullish market, and whether you go long or whether you go short. How do you do it? I know a lot of people are afraid to go long because the market's up, and they think it's extended, but I'm telling you it's not. And I know a lot of people are afraid to short because they think they can't shorten it, and because the market's too strong.  You can shorten this market, and I'm doing it, and I'm making money. So whether you want to go long or short, come from more information you will learn in this webinar. I teach a class once a year. I do this class. It's called the bullish golden gap course. If you're interested in more information, it's a full two-day course that I spread out actually during the week. I usually do it on the weekends, but I'm doing it during the week. If you have a conflict for the weekend, you can do this Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, I'm doing it. It's a class on how to strategically find, pick, and play stocks at our professional bullish gaps. One time a year I do this. It's May. This is it. The rest of the year. It's May 9th, 10th, and 11th. You could be in the trading room. Then we're gonna teach you a class. It's gonna be an all-day event. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. Cost of the class is $49.99. The class is online. You sign into the room. You have to sign up for it. You can email me to sign up for the information. It's Melissa at thestockswish.com. And I am doing a special earnings season offer because it's the earnings season right now, second quarter.  It's a saving of $1,000. The deadline, though, for this special is May 7th. So, I mean, if you've been wanting to trade and learn my system, you should do it.  Here, hold on. Have a 26-point rating system. You will learn that in the bullish gap course, but it's not the same as going short. The points for going long for bullish gaps are not the same points for the shorts. Just like everything I do, it is very specific, very detailed. It's very Melissa, okay? I am very, very, very analytical in what I do. And that is one of the reasons I have expertly called this market to continue to brand new all-time highs, which the spy will do in the queues I've already done. It's because of the fact that I've know so well how to read something that's weak. I now know how to read something that's strong, which would be bullish gaps, and it's not the same. When I'm looking at bearish gaps, the points are not the same for bullish gaps. Thing you can do to give yourself an edge you wanna do in the market, and that's just the way it is. And I've learned that a long, long time ago. So if you wanna come, it's 430 May 4th, Thursday, email me if you wanna sign up, or just come, no password. See ya there, everybody, and if you're interested in signing up for the bullish gap class, you will get $1,000 off, and you can email me to register. Thanks everyone, have a great day.


Okay, I have like a little question for you guys what What does everybody have that can change the world, but not everyone knows they have it mom Okay, I didn't want to have to use this. I want to keep it for myself But I have a $10 Dutch girls gift card for anyone who answers this right What is something that everyone has That can change the world, but not everyone knows they have it Okay, it starts in in and ends in ends Starts in in and ends with ends someone said internship No, it starts with in and ends with ends Okay, I heard a couple of people say influence.  Hey, whoever said influence. No, no, I heard someone over here someone back there No one wants $10 No one no one wants $10 Okay, let's give a round of applause Okay, so I'm gonna be speaking today about Influence and influence is something that we all have whether you believe it or not But it's something that that we all have and like I mentioned earlier. It's something that can change the world So influence is something when you make an impact or change the way someone acts You know like recently like, you know the water bottle flipping thing You know it takes one person to do it put it online and the whole world is doing it or like the little fidget spinner You know one person brought one to school now everyone has one. I have one, but As Christians, we're called to live in influential life. So that's gonna be my first point We're called to live an influential life So when but when you think about it, we all live influential lives Like everyone lives an influence influential lives like, you know, Justin Bieber everyone copies what he does You know the popular kid that your school everyone has influential lives But the thing is as Christians, we're not called to live ordinary lives. We're called to live extraordinary lives so the way we have to live is Extraordinary influential life and the extra doesn't just come just because you're a Christian But it comes from the way that you act it comes from the way that you act at school The way that you treat your parents the way that you talk to your friends, you know You're not at church.  So you could say you're a burrito, right?  You're not a burrito, right? You're just you're just like everyone else so I heard this story a while ago and I was listening to a podcast by Francis Chan and he went to He went to a third world country To be a part of one of their services and as he was there he was paying attention to how they do things He was watching everyone and the he said that it was the most amazing thing He had seen because everyone in the service was worshiping everyone was giving their all They were all praying they were all worshiping and they weren't doing it to look good But they're doing it from the bottom of their hearts. They're doing it with their all You know not just not just praying so that they look good to their neighbor and You know he after service he had stayed around like everyone stayed no one left and he was asking them questions and he had asked one of the He asked the pastor. He said we're we're all the fake Christians You know we're all the other the lukewarm people the people that aren't really Christians But they come to church to say they're Christians and as soon as he said that the whole church Just busted out laughing like it wasn't like like a little giggle It was like the funniest joke you've ever heard laughing like they were laughing and he was like sitting there serious like Wondering why they're laughing at it. So that's so he they all finished laughing and they're like wondering They're what do you mean fake Christian and they explained to him that where they live to say to say you're a Christian It's not just a title a sacrifice comes with it because over there if you say you're a Christian People are gonna take your land people are gonna steal from you people are gonna humiliate you You know there's people that were being persecuted for saying they're Christian So for them saying a Christian wasn't just wasn't just something that they say it was something that came with Sacrifice something that it wasn't just just a title wasn't just to look good But it was something that came with the sacrifice And I believe that's how Christian should be living nowadays that they shouldn't look at Christian as a title It's not something it's not just it's not something to do cool to be cool You know it's not something cool.   You're not yelling at your teammates You're not yelling at the opponents, but you're setting a good example by the things that you do and the way that you act and My second my second reason is going to be seek God to the fullest So consistent Consistency and prayer and Bible reading. It's not gonna come easy You have to constantly be thriving to make it a lifestyle make it a part of you You have to push yourself to pray and push yourself to read the Bible Even when you're not motivated to even when you don't feel like it, you know, that's saying fake it till you make it This is the only reason this is the only time that you can use it Because you know, even if you don't feel like it even if you're not motivated to and you know Your reasons aren't the right reasons to pray You have to push yourself to pray every single day and push yourself until it becomes a lifestyle so So I used to I used to try to be consistent in my prayer life But you know, I was it was it was hard I would my fire would always my flame would always die out after like two days and like it was hard to continue to keep praying I'm serious but um It's hard Yeah, my fire would go out until eventually God gave me the opportunity to be able to evaluate my life and See that what I do the things that I do today I will what will make a difference tomorrow. Come on repeat after me what I do today Will make the difference tomorrow All right, so for example When I first started coming to church, I didn't come because I wanted to live a holy lifestyle I came because my sister made me I was forced to come to church and It was against my will and I did not want to come but if it weren't for that I wouldn't be where I am today And when I first started coming, you know, it wasn't for my reasons It wasn't because I wanted to live a holy lifestyle But because I was forced to but once God met my motives behind no God once God met me my motives began to shift I Began to be I began to start coming, you know Not because I was forced to not because my sister made me But because I actually wanted to build a relationship with Christ because I wanted to change my life and begin to live a life for Christ And so once God meets you through your constant seeking You will start noticing a shift and your prayers will begin to bring you closer to God my favorite part about this is that Once you become that wants to become the part of you once this happens once he meets your needs You know, you'll become a lifestyle and it'll be it will become easier But the best part is that all the worldly things all those things will become the most unattractive thing to you and though and God's will and a godly lifestyle will become the most important thing in your life and Last and most important way to live a godly lifestyle is to surround yourself with the people on the same path and goal Which is to seek a relationship with God Like it said in 1st Corinthians bad company corrupts good morals So no matter how determined you are no matter how hard you want to try to be to start reading your Bible to start having a relationship The people that are around you will determine whether it will they will hit either hinder you or they will either lift you up And I'm not telling you like no Christian friends like only surround yourself with Christian people But you have to make sure that the time that you spend with your Christian people are more are greater than the time You spend with the un-Christian because once you start spending time more time with the un-Christian friends That's when they'll begin to hinder you That's when they will begin to bring you down and you will begin to live the lifestyle that they're living So like for me, I know most of you probably know my testimony, but Excuse me. Sorry Okay, but in seventh grade Back then like in sixth grade. I never thought I was gonna I never thought I would be a person to smoke I never thought I would be a person to hang around bad people. I was always good keeping up with my grades. I had Nostril days, but I had good grades and not I I always caught up with my work And I was always doing good until eventually I started hanging around these two other guys You know, there were the cool kids in the class and I started hanging around them And you know my time began to increase. I began to spend more and more time with them and Sooner or later. I began to be like them. I began to talk like them. I began to cuss like them I played basketball like them. That was good, but I began to be more like them and Eventually it led into some deeper and darker things. I began to I began to seek to their approval I began to want to be like them and that is what led me to begin to begin to cuss that's what led me to start smoking and living that lifestyle and I didn't I didn't want to be a part of it until I had seen how I had seen them doing it And I had seen how you know, there were the popular kids and I wanted to be like that So then I began to do that stuff And it wasn't till my sister invited me to church and I began began to hang around these people Like Zaki and Jacob, you know, they're the biggest part that made me who I am today because if it weren't for them I would still be living my life the way that I was because they helped me see that you know living a Christian life It's not boring. It's not it's not the Bible is in a book of do this and don't do that You know, it's a it's a it's a story of someone that died on the cross for you Someone that loves you so much that they literally died on the cross for you You know, you hear that so much that it's like it's not a big deal anymore But really every time you hear it should be a bigger and bigger deal because someone literally died for you to be able to So that you could get to know your father So, you know, I want to encourage you guys I want you guys to begin to evaluate your life to see who are the toxic people in your life That are constantly bringing you down to see who's keeping you from reaching your full potential Who's keeping you from getting to where you want to be, you know, what's in the way of that? You know, and I don't want you guys to wait for For a wake-up call don't wait for a wake-up call do not wait until Until you get expelled do not wait until you know your friend Your friend and don't wait until you get a DUI don't wait until your friend come in suicide Don't wait for that the wake-up call is now.  What is keeping you from reaching where you want to be? You know instead of being the person that going at a party and getting a DUI You can be that person that your friend calls to pick that you so you can pick them up you instead of you know Instead of waiting to your friend commits suicide be the person to be there pray with them be the person that's gonna be There's a pray with them and influence life into them Instead of waiting to get expelled instead of waiting for your friend to get expelled be the person that Influence them to do better in school show them that there's you know that there's no point in living a life Where you're slacking on everything where you're slapping on even school.   Who's keeping you from reaching what you want to what you want to be tomorrow?