[singlepic=41,320,240,,left]Last night Sheikh Yusuf Estes reached a high point on his South African tour with an excellent talk at the University of Witwaterstrand. A jam packed auditorium greeted us as we entered. Myself and a few others settled for the aisle carpet floor so as to open up seating for the elderly and women audience.
Religion-wise, Sheikh Estes did a quick hand count to reveal a 90% Muslim audience the balance of various Christian, Hindu & African native religions. The programme began with Qari Mohamed Saleh giving a beautiful recitation of a few chapters from the Holy Quran. Lumps formed in our throats and the Qari & my Imam at our local Masjid recited Surah Fatiha, Ad-Duha & Iklas
Finally Sheikh Yusuf Estes addressed the crowd, as always his trademark lighthearted humorous approach captivated our hearts & minds and for the entire evening kept us all glued to our seats. He began with the describing the lack of the English language and how English struggles to give a true meaning to the Arabic holy text, even a single letter in Arabic takes several words to give a meaning to. He touched on the inconsistencies in the Bible, Trinity. The subject of him coming into the fold of Islam and how his parents, who were devout Christians, accepted his decision and ultimately accepted Islam.
Finally the Q&A session touched on the differences between the Old & New Testament in the bible, Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, Islam in America.
In coming weeks I’ll hope to have recordings of his various talks and posted online.
All in all, the event went off perfectly, perhaps next time our sisters with babies could arrange for a babysitter at home (yes the crying infants did annoy man of us).
Subhannallah! This morning after the Fajr Salaah, Imam Saleh informed me that a woman from the audience last night, so impressed by the beauty of Islam, Quran, & our Messenger (PBUH), embraced Islam that very evening and recited the Shahadah! To add to this good news, Radio 702’s John Robbie has finally agreed to give Sheikh Yusuf Estes airtime. Inshallah, I’ll try to have an mp3 recording of this interview for the rest of the Ummah to listen to.
Sheikh’s tour is halfway through, theres still many more talks scheduled so if you have not attended any, please make a point to attend, muslim or non muslim you are sure to benefit.
click here to view the official itinerary & the official advert for the tour