Nine and a Half Months in Santa Barbara

So in the time of the Prophet (peace be upon him) it was very simple. Lā ilāha illā Allāh would simply be very strong. It is like today: anyone who has had any experience with a person interested in Islam knows that some people are very simple. They ask about Islam, they are told some of the beautiful aspects of Islam, and they are willing to accept the religion; and then they become very, very strong Muslims.

There are other kinds of people. There is, for example, the account of one individual at the local university in Santa Barbara. He came to every single Jumuʿah khuṭbah, to every single tafsīr class held there, and to any other classes that were held; he came to every single one of them, for about eight and a half to nine and a half months. He was more regular than anybody else in the community, than any other Muslim in the community; and that is no exaggeration made just to make a point, but a serious statement. He had not yet embraced Islam. He came in for every single class; nor, it should be clarified, was he a spy. He was a serious student, asking questions. He had a lot of confusion about theology, and about some Catholic beliefs and so on. He was from a mixed marriage.

No one pushed him. No one told him simply to say lā ilāha illā Allāh. Because the idea is not to get everybody to say lā ilāha illā Allāh and then have no follow-up. Such people really have no idea what they are entering into. Seriously: about matters that concern them, they have no idea; there is no clarification. Then one day, at ʿAṣr time or thereabouts, he came and knocked on the door of the teacher of those classes (who may not even have been at home at the time), saying that he wanted to embrace the faith now. He asked all the questions that he wanted, and then he became a Muslim, after nine and a half months or so. Māshāʾ Allāh, after that he had to go through a lot of difficulties because of family, and so on. But he persevered very strongly.