The More I Read The Quran, The More I’m Convinced - Nouman Ali Khan

The Quran's Call to All Humanity

I'm very seriously thinking about doing an entire commentary on the Quran just for Christians. Just hey, I know we're not the same religion. I just want you to know by Islam - here's what this book says and I won't use a lot of the Arabic that I use with you guys. I won't say أمة (ummah) and أخوة (khuwa) and تقوى (taqwa) because they don't know that stuff, right? But to do a commentary for them.

Because Allah's claim in this ayah is that they are going to be absolutely convinced. Among them, anybody who has - when they come across these ayat, they'll be absolutely convinced. And so it's probably a shame that we haven't done our job talking to them.

Right, and the young people here that are enthusiastic about studying the Quran, learning the Quran - you should be learning it and you should be talking the Quran. You should be talking the Quran as if you're talking to a non-Muslim friend, not reading the Quran - talking the Quran. And you should be doing that in European languages. If you know German than German, French than French, Spanish than Spanish - do that. Let people hear it. Let people hear with the word of Allah.

The Number Nineteen as a Test

Allah decided to throw people that want to turn something into something else for a spin and then Allah says and by the way, the angels are going to take care of hell. So you're not going anywhere - your jokes, you're going to be crying about them soon.

And we didn't put their number there - as if to say we didn't mention their number in the surah except to create a fitna for those who disbelieve, the كفار (kuffar). What does that mean, to create a fitna? They're gonna get - they're gonna ask dumb questions about it. But more importantly, they think they can now attack Islam because the number 19 was mentioned. "Ah, we finally got something we can start a new fitna against Islam." Allah says you want fitna? Here, do it. Knock yourself out. Let's see how good you do with your little fitna.

I would argue the same way - centuries later, Orientalists say, "Man, I gotta find some controversy in the Quran." Allah says you want controversy, little kafir? You want a controversy? Here's a long ayah in the middle of Surah Al-Muddathir. Here, write your paper. They read this and they have this herniated disc like "Oh my God, there's a long ayah in the Makkan surah." Now they have to go see a doctor because it became a fitna for them.

This is Allah - they want to play games with Allah. Allah says اللَّهُ يَسْتَهْزِئُ بِهِمْ - Allah is making a joke out of them. That's really what this is. This is Allah mocking them.

The People of the Book's Response

And so he says we didn't make this number except as a trial, or except as a means by which they can create a problem, or weaponize - the disbelievers can weaponize something against Islam. You can look at it that way too - a terrible fitna for those who disbelieve. Another meaning of this is all non-Muslims - non-Muslims generally are not kuffar. They could become Muslim. In fact, even Christians came to meet the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم, heard the Quran for the first time and they started crying and they said إِنَّا كُنَّا مِن قَبْلِهِ مُسْلِمِينَ - "We were already Muslim before this."

So the Quran tells us Christians came and said we were already Muslim before this. So there's an Islam inside and there's an Islam outside. When they heard the revelation, the Islam that was inside came outside, right? But then there are people that don't have نور (noor) inside. They have kufr inside.

Allah threw this out. So the people that have kufr inside - they're thinking about the Quran, but they're only studying or listening to the Quran carefully to find something to attack. They're not listening to it to learn. They're listening to it to attack. And Allah wanted to expose the people that are engaging with the Quran for the wrong reason. So he throws the number 19 at them and then they come out and they expose that they're just trying to make fitna. They think they're testing the Quran - Allah was the one testing them so they could be exposed. This is the Quran's genius.

The Secret Meetings of the Elites

And then Allah mentioned something very strange: لِيَسْتَيْقِنَ الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَابَ - so the people that have been given the book may come to make, may come to be convinced. They may be fully convinced - the people that were given the book may be convinced.

I told you this is an early Meccan surah. An early Meccan surah - we think we are dealing with the kuffar and we deal with the people of the book when we go to Medina. This ayah has a lot of discussion among the Mufassirun, but I'm going to reduce that conversation to two conclusions my team and I - Jawad and I particularly - we have reached about this ayah.

One of them is that the Quraysh that were mentioned in this surah - the Walid ibn Mughirah types - they're the 1% I keep saying, right? They're the 1% financially, politically, socially. On the other side, there are Jewish tribes all around Arabia. They are considered the 1% intellectually and religiously. In fact, a lot of the Arab tribes that were even pagan took a lot of their customs and traditions from the Jewish tribes.

So when they are dealing with this man who claims to be a prophet and they're saying our campaign is gonna be "he's a magician," they also went to the tribes of the Jews and said, "This guy is claiming to be a prophet. Do you have anything you can give us to attack him because you guys know religion a lot more than we do?" So now the financial and political 1% is trying to get help from the religious 1%.

Those leaders - they have access to their scripture. Yes or no? But do the Jewish regular public have access to the scripture? No. These key points you have to keep in mind to understand where I'm going with this. وَمِنْهُمْ أُمِّيُّونَ لَا يَعْلَمُونَ الْكِتَابَ إِلَّا أَمَانِيَّ - among them are uneducated people. They don't know the book except their own thoughts, their own wishes. وَإِنْ هُمْ إِلَّا يَظُنُّونَ - they're just making assumptions. They don't know.

So the rabbi class, the priest class - they know. They go to them and they recite these ayat. They recite these ayat now - they're reciting these out for what purpose? "This is what he's saying. Can you give us a counter argument? Can you give us something to dismantle Islam?" Now they're reciting this to the rabbi. The kuffar are so impacted by the Quran they've even memorized the surah and they're reciting it to their secret friends.

And the rabbi is sitting there listening and he's going, "Say what now? Is that what he..." Because the rabbi has access to the secret scriptures, and in many of those secret scriptures there are things - as he's hearing the Quran, what is dawning on the rabbi? "He is the prophet that we've been studying." "I got a إجازة (ijaza) from my sheikh last year on the Prophet that's coming. I learned all of the evidences for the final prophet that's coming. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. This is - this is him."

The Conviction of the Believers

And it's very possible that even in their secret scrolls, somewhere in their scriptures, there's a mention of the 19 guards of hell. But they don't give a dose about that because they don't even want to talk about hell. Do they? Didn't they popularize that there is really no hell, just a lobby where you wait for 12 months?

But it doesn't mean that all of their records that they don't share - if you search this, you'll find there are Jewish biblical archives that they consider too sensitive to interpret for the general public - too much room for misinterpretation, so they don't share them with the public. The same is true of the Catholic Church. There are Bible documents - not just church documents, Bible documents in the church, in the Catholic, in the Vatican - that no one has access to except the church fathers.

And it's extremely plausible to me that perhaps if - because if you search "is there a number 19 thing in the Bible somewhere," you won't find it except with some numerology. But it's extremely plausible to me that even this number 19 is mentioned somewhere in their books that they don't share with the public. And after the Quran came, now they're really not going to share with the public.

So now they are reciting this to them and they're listening. "What number did he say?" They say 19. لِيَسْتَيْقِنَ الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَابَ - so that the people that were given the book, meaning these elite rabbis, they become completely convinced. "This is it."

But this is very similar to Walid ibn Mughirah. Remember when he thought about it? When he thought about it, did he just think about it or did he also do his calculations? Because if he just thought about it - فَكَّرَ and didn't do قَدَّرَ - he could have become a believer. What did the rabbis do when they heard that this is the truth? Did they do فَكَّرَ or didn't do فَكَّرَ or قَدَّرَ also? فَكَّرَ, قَدَّرَ, right?

The Test of Standing Firm

When regular Jews used to go listen to the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم in Medina - this is later on in Medina - regular Jews go listen to the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and they say, "Hey, he was telling about Ibrahim عليه السلام and Musa عليه السلام and he was telling us about all the things we learned from you, but he was telling them even more truthfully. It was pretty amazing, rabbi. Remember you were telling us there's a last prophet coming? I think this is him, based on your sermon from last Sabbath. This is him."

And the rabbi would tell him, the leader would tell him, "Are you gonna go tell them things that Allah will use against you on Judgment Day? Don't open your mouth again to them. Keep it away from you. You can be here and don't become - you be quiet."

But that's later on in Medina. This is early on, and early on, even if it seems Allah says that the people of the book when they heard this, they were supposed to hear it to attack Islam, but they heard it and they're like, "This is it." But not all people of the book were corrupt. Not all the Jews were corrupt. Not all the Christians were corrupt, especially the leadership of the Jews.

Allah says some of them might even have iman, and remember وَإِنَّا لَمِن قَبْلِهِ لَمُسْلِمِينَ, right? So what does Allah say? وَيَزْدَادَ الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِيمَانًا - and there were those who among them already had iman, and when they heard this Quran, it increased them even more in iman. In other words, they might even become Muslim, and maybe they didn't become Muslim openly until the Prophet moved to Medina.

The Prophet's Unwavering Stand

It could also mean believers themselves will increase in iman. I'll come to that interpretation in a second, but we'll stick to this one possible theory that this is Allah describing the secret conversations that the elites were having among each other, and Allah is exposing it in the Quran. One of the great powers of the Quran is that it exposes that which was hidden. People that having their meetings in secret - Allah is making them public and everybody's reciting Quran about it. This is something that happens over and over again in the Quran.

So لِيَسْتَيْقِنَ الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِيمَانًا - and those that have faith, have had faith, they may increase in terms of their faith. وَلَا يَرْتَابَ الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَابَ وَالْمُؤْمِنُونَ - and those who were given the book and those who truly have belief will never fall into doubt again. There's nothing that can put them in doubt again. This is one way to look at it.

Let's go back and look at it another way. Did the Quran open itself up to attack and criticism by mentioning the number 19? Yes, it did. It offered the enemy an opportunity to find something to turn into a fitna, didn't it? And when you say something that can be used against you - like you guys, some of you that are not so Islamic follow some drama on TikTok, right? And somebody got caught on film saying something or some video went viral, and when it goes viral and they realize that they said something bad and it's gonna hurt their following, what do they do after that? They make an apology video. You've seen those. "I realize now that what I said was cruel and I'm going through a lot of stuff. I'm healing right now as a process, going through a process of healing, and I just hope you guys understand that I've done a lot of reflecting..." You know what I'm talking about.

When you say something and it can be used against you, what could you do? You could retract the statement. Now the people of the book, the leadership of the Jews and the Christians that were corrupted, they were used to hiding things and taking them back all the time. So when they see this man claiming to be a prophet and then from his mouth comes the number 19 or this ayah, and it does become a fitna - what would they expect him to do if he's just like them? He won't recite it the next time until it'll die down and nobody will even remember there was an ayah called عَلَيْهَا تِسْعَةَ عَشَرَ. They all rhyme anyway. If you just skip that one and you say سَأُصْلِيهِ سَقَرَ ۝ وَمَا أَدْرَاكَ مَا سَقَرُ ۝ لَا تُبْقِي وَلَا تَذَرُ ۝ لَوَّاحَةٌ لِّلْبَشَرِ ۝ كَلَّا وَالْقَمَرِ - I mean people will make fun of it now, but three, four years from now, it's gonna be buried. Nobody's gonna find the record. You could just bury this thing.

But Rasool صلى الله عليه وسلم - is he shaken by their criticism? Is he not reciting this ayah anymore? Is he providing justifications for this ayah? Is he coming up with explanation videos? "Yeah, I said 19, but there's a context." Or is he doing any of that? No. So these rabbis are like, "He's not backing down. The only people that never back down were prophets. They didn't back down. When they say something, when God's revealed something and people mock, and they stand their ground - last time we saw that was Moses, Jesus, these people, previous prophets."

So now this Rasool صلى الله عليه وسلم standing by the Quran itself became a reason for them to be convinced he's a prophet. And the believers, the new Muslims around the prophet's life - for them, the new Muslims, they're not a big community. There's just a handful of new Muslims. They don't have a support system. They don't have families that encourage them to stay Muslim. Everybody's telling them to go back, leave this crazy religion. That's who they are.

And now all of them have to hear, "You're the 19 people, right? Yeah, 19." They're hearing this all the time. So they're - now that it's supposed to be that their confidence in Islam should go down because everybody's making fun of this possible ayah, and yet when they see their leader, they see the messenger of Allah صلى الله عليه وسلم standing firm and the Word of Allah not budging from it, and actually even going deeper into the number 19 and saying, "I put this number there to test you. You think we're being tested? You're the ones being tested" - they see that and their iman, instead of going down, what happens to it? It goes up. Their iman gets even higher.

The Continuous Journey of Faith

وَيَزْدَادَ الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِيمَانًا وَلَا يَرْتَابَ الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَابَ وَالْمُؤْمِنُونَ - and those who were given the book, meaning the Christians and Jews, وَالْمُؤْمِنُونَ and believers shall never fall into doubt. They won't be falling into doubt.

Let me put it to you this way. I'm studying the Quran for some 25 years now, still studying very much. But maybe something I studied seven years ago, maybe something I studied three years ago, four years ago - some ayah - and I had questions about that ayah, and then I studied, study, studied, and then "Oh, that's okay." Now I discovered some solution or found some - based on my research, I came to some understanding of that ayah. Is it possible that two years later I come back to the same ayah and I forgot my solution? Not possible. And all of a sudden I'm having the same questions I used to have all over again.

Thankfully, things are recorded now. I can go back and say, "Was I..." Because I'm dumber now? Maybe I was smarter than everybody, like, one time. I hate listening to my voice. I cannot stand my - I don't know how you people listen. Honestly, Allah reward you. You know, because you don't really know how you sound, right? Somebody turns me on - "There's my video." "Please. Please stop."

Anyway, there was one درس (dars) I had done on some surahs. It's from Juz Amma and I was gonna do another درس and I was like, "Let me listen to my older, dumber self." When I was like 23, I gave a lecture on this and somehow it's recorded. So I found it. I heard - play. I started listening to myself. I'm like, "Wow, I used to be really smart. I got dumber. I said that? I don't remember saying that. That was pretty good. Wow. Wow, old me." It's like I'm listening to someone else, because we don't have that kind of perfect memory, right?

So it could be that somebody had some kind of a philosophical crisis and they thought about it, investigated, discussed, and eventually they overcame that philosophical crisis. Now they overcame that crisis, they can move on, they're not thinking about that every day. Years go by, they come back to that same philosophical question. Do they remember all the ways they solved that crisis? Not necessarily. So it could be there's an ayah that was causing somebody some confusion and they thought about it and they contemplated it and they arrived at a satisfying conclusion and it increased them in their faith. Years go by, they come back to that ayah and maybe they're starting at zero again, isn't it?

Allah says he made the Quran in a way that you come to it and you find - it increases you in iman, and years later you come back to it and you won't fall into doubt ever again. It will renew your iman all over again. You don't have a stale relationship with the Quran. You go back to it and you start over again with the Quran, and it takes you through a faith journey again. It convinces you again. It convinces you again.

Like I can testify to this in my own life. When somebody says, "What convinced you of the Quran?" I don't have an answer for that, because I keep getting convinced of the Quran. It's not something that happened. It keeps happening. The more I engage with the Quran, it - like I convert every day over again, over again, over again.

وَلَا يَرْتَابَ الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَابَ وَالْمُؤْمِنُونَ - doubts just keep that there's not even room for doubts to come, because you keep engaging with this book. So Allah says Allah gave these ayat so that people can - the people of the book can find conviction and those - there will, until Judgment Day, there will be people that are sincere with the Bible. They're sincere in their Judaism. They're sincere in their Christianity. And when those people that are sincere, sincerely with the right reasons - not to find fitna - for the right reasons come to this book, they will be left with no doubt. That's the claim of the Quran.

A Call for Islamic Outreach

And it's interesting in this ayah, Allah has given us a kind of a campaign, and it's something I didn't think about until very recently. I've been giving all these lectures for all these years for the Muslim community, right? And I know non-Muslims listen to some of my lectures too, but I don't have them in mind when I'm giving my lectures. I have us in mind, right? But when Allah says وَلَا يَرْتَابَ الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَابَ - like those who've been given the book will not have any doubts left. Also the believers - who did he put first?

I realized, man, I think the most - the biggest Quranic dawah is actually to humanity, and starting - I would believe starting with Christians. Actually, I'm very seriously thinking about doing an entire commentary on the Quran just for Christians. Just hey, I know we're not the same religion. I just want you to know by Islam - here's what this book says. And I won't use a lot of the Arabic that I use with you guys. I won't say أمة (ummah) and أخوة (khuwa) and تقوى (taqwa) because they don't know that stuff, right? But to do a commentary for them.

Because Allah's claim in this ayah is that they are going to be absolutely convinced. Among them, anybody who has - when they come across these ayat, they'll be absolutely convinced. And so it's probably a shame that we haven't done our job talking to them.

Speaking the Quran, Not Just Reading It

Right, and the young people here that are enthusiastic about studying the Quran, learning the Quran - you should be learning it and you should be talking the Quran. You should be talking the Quran as if you're talking to a non-Muslim friend, right? Not reading the Quran - talking the Quran. And you should be doing that in European languages. You know German than German, French than French, Spanish than Spanish - do that. Let people hear it. Let people hear with the word of Allah.

And you know, you could just start out your own little TikTok channel and read a German translation of the Quran. You could do that, but you're gonna sound uninteresting, boring, and lame. "In the name of Allah, the most beneficial, the most merciful. This is the book in which there is no doubt." Or you can say, "No, I'll just get an AI voice to it. This is the book in which there's no doubt." But when you do it as a believer, do you know that when you speak your conviction, your feeling, your heart's connection to what you're saying becomes one with your words? Like it's not just words that are coming across. Your heart is also coming across. Your emotion. Your conviction is also coming across.

Can you bring conviction - your conviction? Can you communicate your conviction to someone in a printed translation of the Quran? Will that come across? No. When you start speaking the Quran - not reading the Quran - speaking though, which means you have to become as familiar with the Quran to the point where you can speak it. And if it's not the entire Quran, just make Surah Al-Baqarah your project. "I just want to speak Surah Al-Baqarah. I just want to speak Fatiha." Can I speak Fatiha? Can I speak Baqarah? So that when people experience that, they hear speech. They don't hear a book. They don't hear rehearsed dialogue or an essay. They hear someone talking and they see, "Where are you getting this from? Where is this coming from?"

Two things happen when you speak naturally. The person listening to you - they don't realize that you're lecturing. They think you're having a conversation. That's why you can listen to hours of a podcast but not even five minutes of a lecture. It's different, right? Podcast - people are having a conversation. You can listen and listen and listen. The moment you open up a lecture - "الحمد لله..." "Oh, when it's not..." Because it's a lecture. Something in my mind - there's a part of my brain that releases sleeping gas when I hear "my brothers and sisters in Islam," because nobody in a conversation ever says "my brothers and sisters in Islam." You're not sitting with your friends in a burger place and they say, "My brother in Islam, can you give me the ketchup?" You don't do that.

You speak. You're not doing a stage performance or like a formal address. You're not addressing - you're the dude at the restaurant. "Yo, some ketchup." This is natural, and that's what the Quran deserves. And I believe there's a key here for the wave of dawah that's to come.

The Unity of Believers and People of the Book

Then Allah says وَلِيَقُولَ الَّذِينَ فِي قُلُوبِهِمْ مَرَضٌ وَالْكَافِرُونَ - so Allah put two groups together - the people of the book and the believers, right? You know what that means to me? A lot of them - to me it means a huge number of the people of the book are potentially believers. That's what the hint is in this ayah. But then so they've been bunched together - the people of the book and the believers have been bunched together. It's not a big jump for them, actually.

Many of them Allah describes - they're gonna hear Quran and start crying. I'm witness to this - my friends that have gone to churches and recited Surah Maryam and even translated it. Half the congregation sitting there - Christians, American as they can get - "Can you do that again?" We'll do that, but we haven't. We just haven't done it. We haven't reached out to them.

And can that change even geopolitics? Can it change the map of the world? Can it change how the world sees Islam itself for millions and millions of people? There's enough of us - if enough of us are having a Quran conversation, the world will - the world will hear the Quran, the whole world.

The Disease in Hearts

And so that people who have a sickness in their heart - the word مرض (marad) actually has to do with weakness in the Arabic language. The word مرض is used when there's too many clouds in the sky and there's not enough sunlight coming in. Then that's actually - the sky is called مريد (mareed) because the light is weak. So it's called مريد.

The idea of مرض - there's something isn't functioning the way it normally should. That's actually the purpose of the word. Something isn't functioning the way it should. When Allah says there's a sickness in their heart - obviously, we know when you have a sickness then something in your body isn't functioning the way it should. The heart is supposed to function a certain way. The heart - where Allah created the heart to find him. Allah created the heart to find the truth. Allah created the heart to be grateful to Allah. That's what Allah created the heart for. But when there's a sickness in it, it's not finding the truth. It's holding on to some kind of virus like greed, and now it's only looking for things that further the greed.

Allah says about people who have a sickness in their heart, and then he says الكافرون (al-kafirun) - those who have kufr. Now there's two categories - those who have a sickness, which is like the hypocrites. It can also be those that are non-Muslim and have a sickness in their heart. So they're not full-on kafir. They're not outwardly kafir, but they have a problem internally. In fact, I would even argue Walid ibn Mughirah is the closest thing to a منافق (munafiq) in kafir form, because there's like a hundred percent kafir inside kufr, outside kufr - Abu Jahl, Abu Lahab. Then there's inside iman, outside kufr, inside iman and kufr. What should win? فكر وقدر. So the inside and outside are contradicting each other. Isn't that hypocrisy? Isn't that a disease in the heart? That's what Walid ibn Mughirah is.

Allah is saying those kinds of people and on top of that the kuffar also. So it's so nuanced that the Quran made a distinction between these two groups because there's one group that's ideological and the other group that plays with them, that toys with them. Politicians don't believe what they say, but people who love them believe what they say. The politicians have a disease in their heart. The people are just the كافرون who just go with them. You understand?

Their Mocking Questions

And they'll all just say the same thing. They'll look at this and say ماذا أراد الله بهذا مثلا - "What does Allah mean by this as an example? What does he mean? What did Allah intend by this as an example?"

This to me is a really remarkable phrase. Two things I'll tell you about that. If Allah said ماذا أراد الله بهذا المثل with the لام - هذا المثل - that would be a بدل, that would be a مشار إليه. If that's the question, it becomes a genuine question. For example, you can come to me and say, "Ustadh, what does this ayah mean? What does this word mean? I was studying this example. What does it mean?" Isn't that a genuine question?

But when you say, "What did you mean when you gave this example? Why would you give this as an example?" Is that a genuine question? No, that's a question to say you could have done better. "What is this? I'm supposed to be impressed with this? This is you being condescending."

Questions aren't always questions. Questions can be a criticism. Questions can be an insult. Questions can be anger. Questions can have something behind them. I think there's a TikTok thing too, right? "Tell me you're angry without telling me you're angry," right? "Ask me a question without asking me a question." You understand? This is actually - this is called كناية (kinaya). This is a thing in communication psychology and it's also in the Quran.

So when you say, for example, your mother says to you, "You're gonna wear that?" She's actually not asking you a question and the answer is yes. "Correct observation, mother." She's saying, "You better change that before we have to leave because you're not wearing that," but she doesn't say that. She just says, "You're gonna wear that?" Or your father says, "What did you just say?" When he says, "What did you just say?" You don't say, "I said you made a mistake last year." A question is not always a question.

So what is - this is not actually a question. ماذا أراد الله بهذا مثلا - "What does he mean by this example?" What are they trying to say? "What a ridiculous thing to say. We're supposed to be impressed with - this is your message? 19?" That's what they're actually saying. This is the sickness in their heart. They want to find a way to not engage with the book but to actually dismiss it by mockery, by these kinds of rhetorical questions.

But the other beautiful thing in this is the word مثل. مثل means example. Allah didn't give an example. Allah said there's 19 angels. It's not an example. It's a number. But they said, "What does he mean by this as an example?" Allah is giving us a hint here that actually Allah just gave this number as an example to us, even if it's true, to see what they will do with it. And this is what they did with it. They fell for the trap.

That is how Allah misleads - allows to be misled whoever he wants and guides whoever he wants.