Why am I a Muslim?

By Ahmed Mohamed Mokhtar

Like everyone else, I was born a Muslim. Also, like everyone else, I went through a period that challenged my beliefs. It was a blessing in disguise because it helped me strengthen my foundation and taught me how important knowledge is. This is the difference about Islam; the more challenges you get to your beliefs the stronger they become. In this book, I document my answers to challenges like who created God, the contradictions between "supposed" science like Darwinism and some Islamic beliefs, women rights, and many more. It's not a pedantic academic attempt. It includes stories, scientific arguments and even some jokes. All in all, I tried to make it as fun reading as possible.  

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ahmed Mohamed Mokhtar
• Release date: May 14, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201794835

Ahmed Mohamed Mokhtar

Ahmed Mohamed Mokhtar also knwon as Ahmed Ould Bechiry is from Mauritania and was born in 1992 in Madina, Saudia Arabia. He holds a degree in Sharia and a masters and Ph.D. degrees in Islamic banking and finance. He is active on YouTube and had been active as a blogger

Book preview

Ahmed Mohamed Mokhtar

The proceeds of this book are going to be donated to an organization working to train intellectual Muslim leaders. Follow my YouTube channel under the name Ahmed Ould Bechiry to know when the donation will be transferred.

Index

Index

Introduction

Chapter one

Let’s ask some questions

A cliché moral dilemma

Sensitive issues

Another sexism problem

The elevator incident

Too much freedom?

Chapter Two

How do we know things?

No God, no reason, no rationality

God needs no evidence

The underpinnings of science

Chapter Three

The atheism nonsense

Chapter Four

Darwin’s Shabby Strawman

Inverted retina

Chimp human DNA comparison

Whales’ pelvic bones

Vestigial hindlimbs in pythons

Recurrent laryngeal nerve in giraffes

Human appendix

Junk DNA

Haeckel’s Drawings

Human tail

Scorpions evolving from see animals

A collection of Darwinian hoaxes

Java man

Nebraska man

Noble prize 2018

Life seeded on earth by aliens

Genes functions in the zygote

Scientific consensus

Dismantling Darwinism’s fundamentals

Neo Darwinism is inhibiting science

Chapter Five

Moral Nihilism

Nihilism is just a bad reaction

You must have a dogma

I’m arguing for 22nd-century values!

Israel Keyes or Vincent Van Gogh?

For those who care about reality

Chapter Six

Understanding Atheism

The supposed link between science and atheism

Intellectual adolescence

Past experiences with the church

Atheism is comfortable

Chapter Seven

The Four Poisons of Society

Alcohol

Sexual Immorality

Interest

Gambling

Chapter Eight

God in Islam

Chapter Nine

The problem of evil

It is going to happen anyway

No pain no gain

No test no belief

Chapter Nine

The conclusive reliable moral standard

Without God, you cannot argue for morality

The formula

Absurdity sans-frontier

Defined limits

The need for a comprehensive moral system

Moral Flexibility

Chapter Ten

Changing oneself

Atheism and aesthetic feelings

We are weak

Subconscious contentions

Chapter Eleven

Your purpose

The worldly life is nothing but a material of delusion  (Qur’an 57:20)

A purpose is always better than no purpose

There is no guarantee

You can cheat in this test

Chapter Twelve

Muslims Don’t Look Cool

Cheap propaganda

Humans are not necessarily logical

The tide of history

Materialism is running out of momentum

Chapter Thirteen

The detachment between the mind and the heart

Obsessive doubts with no merits

This life is a trial and it’s ok to cheat

We are weak and we are going to die

Conclusion

My call to you

Introduction

I know what you’re thinking. Is this a good book worth skipping my YouTube dose (which is usually an overdose)? I’m not going to sell it to you because I already did. Bad joke you say.  As long as your mood is lightened for what’s coming, I don’t care. Comedy is not how I make a living. Actually, you already realized that from the first sentence. Bad comedy aside, you are now making a decision. This decision would definitely be affected by the values you hold. That’s how important values are. They affect the decisions from the one Hitler took to invade Poland to the one you are taking now to read this book. Both decisions are important by the way.

It has been the seemingly eternal question of humanity to ask before doing anything, I’m I doing the right thing? In fact, it is a question I had to grapple with when I started writing these sentences that you’re reading now my dear friend on the other side.

You might be thinking, another apologetic bluff filled with religious agenda. You’re right. It is my perspective of the world, but it is also full of religious agenda. But, does that render it false right away without giving it a chance? I’m a Muslim and I love my religion. I truly believe it is the best blessing I’ve ever and will ever have in my life. That’s why I want to share it with you. Nonetheless, no apologetics here. Islam needs to defend itself against nothing. It is there to save your life. You can take it or leave it. God gains nothing by you worshiping him and loses nothing if you deny him. The one at stake is your own life. Anyway, let’s get back to the topic.

If you think that, in any stage of your life in the future, you will be able to get rid of that question (am I right), then, think again. All you can hope for is that this perplexity and sense of lack of guidance will subside and you’ll have just sufficient knowledge to make a mildly satisfying decision and get rid of the sense of guilt you feel after each adverse outcome. You will be probably doing very good things like some charity works that will overwhelm you with joy. Helping others is an absolute joy. But you’ll probably ask yourself, why am I doing this? You would probably get an answer sufficient to brush aside the issue. However, will that answer sustain your charity work?

Any true satisfaction shall only come if you predicate your decision on stable and maybe to an extent, dogmatic grounds. This book seeks to reveal some concepts that you might not have been aware of prior to that or if you did, it will look at it form an angle a bit refreshing, if not surprising. I dare to make the promise that the justification I’m going to provide will give you the ability to sustain that good work and will enable you to answer any objection that you may have to doing a good work. Don’t prejudge my proposition before testing it. You might even be able to rebut it and you’ll have one less answer to consider. Actually, there is no legitimate rebuttal. Test my claim in the coming chapters.

Every human action, sometimes, even thought, carry a moral value. It is something we feel regardless of our beliefs be it atheistic or religious (those who say atheism is not a belief, give me a break!). It is, therefore, how we build our morality that gives us that sense of guidance to decide whether a certain action is right or wrong.

You have all the right to assess it (objectively with no biases and prejudices) and maybe you can shoot it although I wish wholeheartedly that you accept it. For Muslims, this book is still for you. It gives you a new perspective and enhances your existing values which will make you appreciate what you have even more. If you already believe in this system, I’m quite sure that it will strengthen your position and enable you to represent it more effectively in front of others. Sometimes, if you have a valuable asset, you fail to appreciate it because you tend to take it for granted. This book shall make you look differently at what you have.

Chapter one

Let’s ask some questions

Ever had to hang out with friends when you had an assignment approaching and you thought, I’m I doing the right thing? Have you had to reply to a question like is that a good movie and you didn’t know from what angle to look at it? Maybe it was a movie like the Joker, and you had things that you liked about and things you detested, what is the right reply? Ever had to decide on a job and you wondered, is it right for me? I’m not clickbait-ing you to say this book gives you the answer to these questions. It doesn’t. However, thank you for buying it!

Before you put it back on the shelf, it does, however, give you the formula that might guide you to make the decision and feel good about it regardless of the outcome. It tries to tell you how to employ your regret in the right way and how to not regret unnecessary things. One caveat though, it requires discipline and hard decisions. There is no replacement for the nicest cliché wisdom; no pain, no gain.

It is based on a robust coherent model that has a solid basis which accommodates a plethora of possible structures. You will have the foundation that makes your moral foundation stable but gives you the ability to change the design as the parameters dictate.

You might have one of these ideas at this moment. You might think that you already have a moral system up and running and you don’t need any other one. I invite you then to read this because it will either poke holes in your moral system and provide you with a better one or will make you more confident of yours. You might be looking for a moral system and thinking there are just too many. But it is like going to buy a car; you go and meticulously check all the features, prices, after-sale services, etc. When it comes to morality, you need to be more meticulous. Assess what I’m presenting to you objectively and decide for yourself.

There is a formula to know morality, pretty much, conclusively. I’m using the expression formula knowing that I’m not a mathematician. In fact, it is the only subject in my life that I got a grade below 2/10 in. However, figurative expressions in linguistics allow me to use it so you pedantic nerd on the other side you can... (oh my God, I’m so tempted to use the S-word for these pedantic nerds right now but I’m going to pass that chance and THAT’S a moral decision!)

By a formula, I mean equating between two sides in a predetermined arithmetic expression. In other words, you have a logical expression or syllogism that deduces a result from two premises. The results are either right or wrong. You would say, morality is not that simple, and you would be partially right, and I would say a formula is not that simple either.  I’ll give you the formula later on I promise but I have to first draw your interest to the importance of the subject.

I, and you, would want to have that formula in one page and run with it and probably, apply for a patent. But I need to sell a book of at least 200 pages to make money (although I might make nothing on that). The reality is morality cannot be put is 200 pages. But there is way to know it. For those who think they don’t need it and think that morality is universal, I have some head scratching cases to present to you.

On a beach in Florida, a lifeguard was having a normal day attending to his work keeping a close eye on all visitors in his designated area. Lifeguards have designated areas that they work in and they are prohibited from attending to any distress outside the designated area for good reasons. If they attended to distresses outside their areas, they will spread their efforts thin, they might endanger people in the designated area if they are busy attending to others. Besides, sticking to the rules will encourage swimmer to adhere to the limited area.

During that day, the lifeguard saw a teenager who was about to get drowned outside the designated area. The lifeguard called a colleague to cover up for him and went straight on to rescue the teenager. He managed to do so but he was subsequently fired by his employer for not obeying the rule. Was he right in not obeying the rules? Was the employer right in firing him? Were they both right? Were they both wrong? I’m going to give an answer that I think is true. Mind you, the formula doesn’t say that every decision you make has to be definitively true. The basic fundamental decisions have to be true. However, other decisions can be approximately true. There is a dogma but it’s a mild one.

Let’s see, you watch a heated debate in a parliament (fun fact, or fun regression, whatever... some people are using the word parliament as a collective noun for baboons) about legalizing betting machines. The opposition will say, these machines are the crack cocaine of gambling and people lose their rational thinking the moment they insert the first coin. Another group says that betting companies are paying good amounts to charity and other good amounts in taxes and the benefit they bring to the economy are essentially, countless. The opposition will counter that by saying that all these economic benefits are only for industries linked directly to gambling, everybody else is losing. If that was enough to justify certain practice, we should allow drug dealers to set shops and tax them.  

What do you think my friend on the other side? What are the both groups citing when they try to rationalize their opinions? The first group is clearly assuming that the other side agrees with them that crack cocaine is bad and because the effects of betting machines are the same, they should be as bad as crack cocaine.

The second group is saying economic benefits are good and desirable. betting machines result in good economic benefits and therefore should be allowed.

Most of you my friends on the other side, I would assume, decided that the first argument is a bit more rational or ‘sensible’ as a certain atheist public figure likes to say. That is because, you say, if it is the economic benefit, we might as well allow crack cocaine and heroin and why not, human trafficking. All of these things make great economic benefits to a fringe group of people. We might as well just legalize them and take everybody on the economic benefit board. Quite a sensible argument, right?

What if they say if you are trying to outlaw anything that result in a reduction of human ability to take a rational decision, why don’t you outlaw alcohol and intense marketing?! Why don’t you use the money spent chasing people and arresting gamblers, like some countries in East Asia are doing, on actual education that enables people to preserve their ability to make rational decisions.

Should I carry on with this discussion dear friend on the other side? Or you think it is fruitless and a waste of time and betting machines should be disallowed regardless of the ramifications on the workers, the whole supply chain and the small teddy bears uncle George wanted so bad?

Do you think that each side coming to this argument are carrying some personal benefits and trying to defend them? Aren’t the ones defending betting machines actually company shareholders. And for those going against them, are they opposing them just because of a personal experience of financial loss due to betting or maybe someone close to them has been through that experience. Doesn’t that mean that all their opinions are based on personal interest. Heck, what’s wrong with personal interest? Isn’t the whole world functioning on personal interest? Why don’t India respond to China after the death of 20 of its soldiers on the border? Isn’t it just that India is afraid of the losses that such retaliation will bring? It is not about peace or anything of that sounding-good emotional rant. If India had the power to respond without expecting a worse retaliation, it would have done so with no hesitance.

Is there a way we can engage in a discussion about morality free our personal perspectives? By personal perspectives, I mean something more than personal experiences. I mean all things ego. That also applies to every discussion even when we are having an inner fight between two thoughts.

You know my friend on the other side, I’m at this very moment still in a sort of trivial dilemma, or maybe it is not trivial. I’m thinking, should I structure this book in an academic boring but coherent way (that’s what I have been did for the past two years during my Ph.D. studies), or should I be consistent and avoid the terminologies of ‘pedantic nerds’ I talked about earlier?

You know what! Screw that. I’m just doing it my way. I’ll talk to you like a friend trying hard to avoid any vulgar remarks or overcomplicating things to look a bit smarter or a bit more eloquent. And that’s a moral decision I can’t give up but I also can’t guarantee.

It is the year 2021 and many countries are still suffering from covid-19 pandemic and the economic crisis it brought with it. It has been too long that some people are saying we have to choose between dying by a virus or dying starving. Some are now accusing the World Health Organization of destroying their lives and blowing the danger of the virus out of proportion. If you had the power, what should you decide? Should you end the lockdown and risk a widespread infection or keep the lockdown and risk further economic damages? It is a political decision but it’s also a moral one. As I said every human action, and even thought, carries a moral weight.

A cliché moral dilemma

On a different note. There is a Japanese drama series about two school kids. A 14 years old girl and her schoolmate who is 15 years (one year makes a big difference for these kids). You guessed it, they did something and as they were doing it, the girl, rather profoundly, asked: are we doing the right thing?!! They eventually had a baby, needless to say, without marriage. You now have a situation of two teenagers with a baby. Not so rare in some societies, I guess. I would even say, it’s the cliché moral dilemma.

There was more to this ‘little dilemma’; the girl wanted to keep the baby, but her parents were, understandably, against it. How can a 14 years old teenager raise a child?! Her father talked to the boy basically saying you have to take responsibility. The drama ends with both parents dropping out of school and the boy starting to work in some labor job to scrape by and provide for his accidental family.

Is that an ideal end in a realistic situation? If not, what is the right end of this dilemma? Should they have aborted the child and maybe waited when they are mature enough to have a child? If they did so, what could guarantee that they won’t fall into the same mistake again?

If you decide to take some steps to prevent kids from having such things like making segregated schools wouldn’t that be a give up to religious values? wouldn’t it be a consideration of the parents’ desire without taking kids’ into account? Which desire should prevail; the parents’ or the kids’? If you allowed kids to do it by providing them some contraception, aren’t you afraid