Khalid Yasin

For the jazz musician who also used the name Khalid Yasin, see Larry Young (jazz).

Khalid Yasin (also known as 'Abu Muhammad' , 'Abu Muhammad Khalid Yasin' ) and 'Abu Muhammad, Khalid Yasin' , born in the 1950's in Brooklyn, New York, is a former Christian who reverted to Islam and is now a well known lecturer and teacher.

Yasin now lives and operates his Da'wah organisation in Sheffield, England. He founded, directs and runs the Islamic Broadcasting Corporation and The Purpose of Life Centre on Shirecliffe Lane, Sheffield. The organization was formerly known as the Islamic Teaching Institute (ITI) and the Islamic Information Network Ltd , where it is believed in the past ten years, the ITI has reverted more than 5,000 persons to Islam and an additional 1,700 since the September 11 attacks.

Biography

Yasin was born in Brooklyn during the 1950s amongst a background of civil rights movement, he was separated from his family at an early age and placed in foster homes where "he experienced 'the full buffet' of Christianity and felt that he needed something more simple and clear to inspire him."

Having lectured throughout the world he has been able to study extensively the Qur'an, Islamic legislation and Arabic in Madina, Saudi Arabia and Cairo, Egypt. Yasin emphasises to never accepting more recognition then he is due and only ever admitsto being a 'student of a student of knowledge' and has had many mentors and teachers who tutored him in Islamic history and the memorization and recitation of the Qur'an.

Yasin has said of his organisation, "Members of the local and wider community are welcome at the centre on the weekend for an introduction, or a cup of tea with a resolve to improve links within the community and to offer a place of training, guidance or reflection." and that "Hopefully, the ultimate aim of the centre is to offer to the already vibrant Sheffield community a focal point for the rebuilding of an Islamic civilisation that did not threaten the world, but enriched it."

The main objective in all of his project initiatives is to give people the truth in the clearest, most straightforward and beneficial way to give access to people to the treasure that is Allah's Islam.

Meeting Malcolm X

According to Yasin, as with many of the young Afro-American population at the time, he was first introduced to Islam by the Black Nationalists and Black Muslims, but was "made all the wiser for the defection of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (Malcolm X)."

Yasin has stated in a lecture in 2006 that he is not interested in Malcolm X at all but only in the person that he evolved into, Malik El-Shabazz, the subsequent follower of true Islam and Sunni Muslim as opposed to Malcolm X, the racist, false Islam Nation of Islam minister. Yasin went on to state in a 2006 audio lecture recording in Britain that:

• "Those of us who respect Malcolm who also respected the Nation of Islam… I was never a member of the Nation of Islam because I couldn’t accept the fact that they were saying God was a black man… I liked their habits. I liked their militant, I liked a lot of things I saw in them…. but we were all impressed when Malcolm said he had became an official Muslim, a universal Muslim, according to the doctrines of the Qur’an. When I read that as a non-Muslim I began to think about Islam" and that "When Malcolm return to America as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz I was able to meet Malcolm on January 9th or 11th of that year 1964. Myself and another group of people sat on a roof in the cold, all night, because the streets were all ready full, we couldn’t get a place in the street. We found out where he was going to stand and we stood on that roof all night. When Malcolm came out at 8:30 that morning in Harlem, the streets of Harlem were full, it was almost like it was Hajj. There had to be 35 or 40,000 people filling the streets of Harlem just to see Malcolm - not Muslim, only people who had been moved by his inspiration. We were on the roof that day, we didn’t see him on the ground, but we saw him from the top and we felt we were the luckiest people. Malcolm saw us on that roof up their and asked one of his security guards to get us down and we got a chance to meet him and shake his hand that day. That is as much of a connection I had with Malcolm X the day that we met him and shook his hand. I don’t idolise him and I can only say that from a spiritual point of view he’s like a mentor, a spiritual father for us, so many of us who were contemporaries of Malcolm X we sort of call ourselves: Son of a Prince, because to us Malcolm, or El-Hajj Malik was a Prince.".

Sunday Nights With John Cleary

On September 7, 2003 Yasin appeared on Sunday Nights With John Cleary [1] being interviewed. Cleary stated that:

Right now we’re going to introduce you to someone who, well perhaps is giving a message that many people would be alarmed that is being put about. Sheik Khalid Yasin is visiting Australia at the moment speaking to Muslim groups in mosques around the country. And as this marks the beginning of the week of the anniversary of the dreadful events of September 11 and the destruction of the World Trade Center, this quite frank and some may find disturbing interview with Khalid Yasin is something that I think deserves to be heard. I spoke to Khalid Yasin on Friday. Let me give you an observation from a press release that the group who is sponsoring him brought out. This is what they say:" ‘Last month, a prominent Sydney Islamic Imam accused scholars from abroad of brainwashing young Muslims in Australia. Sheik Yasin’s response to such inferences was that “There is no established religious body in Australia that can cast aspersions on other Muslims. Let anybody come to my talks and they will see that there is absolutely nothing in them that incites others to do wrong.”’ Well on listening to this interview, you may decide otherwise. The controversial Imam spoke at Lakemba mosque on Thursday evening to a packed audience, and he pointed out that in the past ten years there have been more than 5,000 people convert to Islam through his institute and other bodies, and suggests that an additional 1,476 have converted since the September 11 attacks. That’s in the press release accompanying the visit of Sheik Khalid Yasin, our guest on Sunday Night."

60 Minutes

In August 2005, Yasin was interviewed by Australia's 60 Minutes where he stated that 'Muslims should not attend university because it's a "gateway for deviation", homosexuality is punishable by death, and Muslims cannot truly befriend non-Muslims — have caused controversy among LGBT groups & moderate Muslims'

Other

Yasin also lectures with Sheikh Omar Bakri Muhammad

Quotes

• "[T]rust is sacred, and how can you put a sacred trust in the hands of a non-Muslim that doesn't understand what that sanctity is about?"

• "There's no such thing as a Muslim having a non-Muslim friend, so a non-Muslim could be your associate but they can't be a friend." But if you see Sorah Maida it says that the best friends of Muslim can be very good friends who call themselves as Nasara who are not proud and have many philosophers in them.

• "[T]he Sharia is very clear about it, the punishment for homosexuality, bestiality or anything like that is death. We don't make any excuses about that, it's not our law - it's the Quran."

• "Quran teaches the way to a proper life but it is not harsh on anyone. If you are quoting your views it would be good to quote with references to actual location where Quran says such things and in what context this is being said. Don't give the image of our religion as harsh and very strict. Islam is not complete with studying the teachings of Muhammad (Allah's peace be upon him always). If you don't understand your eternal love with God you cant understand Islam and the core of it."

• [on the "Osama bin Laden bogey man"] "This is a creation, they have created this here in the minds of the people, in order to justify a war they call on terror but is really a terror they have put inside the people. It is a war against Islam."

• "There has been no evidence that has surfaced, no bona fide irrevocable, irrefutable evidence that had been surfaced that showed that there is a group called al-Qa'ida that did the September 11 bombings."

• "We now know that the way that the World Trade Center fell the way that those buildings fell - they fell from internal explosive charges, the same way it's done in a construction site."

See also

• Zakir Naik
• Bilal Philips
• Abdul Raheem Green
• Yvonne Ridley
• Abdul Majeed Alee Hasan

Media Production

• Purpose TV(launched 15th January 2008)

External links

• Shaykh Khalid Yasin's official website
• Official website biography
• Khalid Yasin audio and video lectures
• Alternative biography

News articles

• Khalid Yasin: The New Voice of Islam? reported by MSN.com.au
• Feature Interview: Sheikh Khalid Yasin reported by ABC.net.au
• Week captures Islamic spirit reported in dailytargum.com/