Abu Ammaar Yasir Qadhi

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Abu Ammaar Yasir Qadhi
Born 1975 (age 49–50)[1]
Houston, Texas
Residence Memphis, Tennessee
Nationality American
Education M.A. Islamic Creed
B.A. Islamic Sciences
Associate's degree Arabic Language
Islamic University of Madinah
Ph.D Islamic Studies
M.Phil Islamic Studies
Yale University
B.Sc Chemical Engineering
University of Houston[2]
Alma mater Islamic University of Madinah
Yale University
University of Houston[2]
Occupation Instructor
Title Dean of Academic Affairs
Al-Maghrib Institute
Movement Salafi[3]
Website MuslimMatters.org

Yasir Qadhi (also spelled Yasir Kazi[4]) is an American Muslim scholar and writer of Pakistani descent, and Dean of Academic Affairs at the Al-Maghrib Institute, an Islamic educational institution. He has written books and has lectured on Islam and contemporary Muslim issues.[2][5] A 2011 New York Times Magazine essay described Qadhi as "one of the most influential conservative clerics in American Islam".[3] Qadhi is a Salafi.[3]

Early years

Qadhi was born in Houston, Texas, to parents of Pakistani origin.[2][3][6] When Qadhi was five, the family moved to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where he graduated high school two years early as class valedictorian.[3]

After a short stint at Dow Chemical, Qadhi in 1996 enrolled at the Islamic University of Medina in Medina, Saudi Arabia. There he earned a bachelor's degree in Arabic from the university's College of Hadith and Islamic Sciences and a master's degree in Islamic Theology from its College of Dawah.[2][5][6] Qadhi returned to the United States in 2005 after nine years in Saudi Arabia.[6]

Professional career

Qadhi teaches in the Religious Studies Department of Rhodes College, in Memphis, Tennessee. Additionally, he has completed a doctorate in theology at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.[2][5]

Qadhi is also the Dean of Academic Affairs and an instructor for the AlMaghrib Institute,[5] a seminar-based Islamic education institution. The instructors travel to designated locations in the US, UK and Canada (and more recently, Malaysia) to teach Islamic studies in English.[6]

He likens some of the practices he endorses as similar to those practiced by conservative Christian groups and Orthodox Jews in America, particularly with regard to dietary laws,[citation needed] family values, and modest dress for women.[6]

Qadhi was the subject of a segment of Henry Louis Gates television genealogy series Finding Your Roots.[1]

Views on jihad

Qadhi has presented papers on jihad movements. In 2006, at a conference at Harvard Law School, Qadhi presented a 15-minute analysis of the theological underpinnings of an early militant movement in modern Saudi Arabia headed by Juhayman al-Otaibi. The movement had gained international attention when it held the Grand Mosque of Mecca hostage in 1979.[7] In another paper, presented in September 2009 at an international conference at University of Edinburgh on understanding jihad in the modern world, he discussed how a specific legal ruling (fatwā) of the 13–14th century theologian Ibn Taymiyya was used both by jihadist and pacifist groups to justify their positions.[8] The paper has been critiqued, however, by some Salafi commentators.[9]

Views on Islamic extremism

Qadhi is a critic of extremist violence and believes that terrorism is antithetical to Islamic values. He tackles political grievances, criticizing both American foreign policy, which he views as the root of anger among many Muslims, and the religious claims extremists use to justify their violence.[10]

Controversies

In January 2010, The Daily Telegraph, a British newspaper, reported that in 2001 Qadhi had described the Holocaust as a hoax and false propaganda, and had claimed that "Hitler never intended to mass-destroy the Jews."[11] Qadhi denied stating that the Holocaust was a hoax or that it was false propaganda, but admitted that he had briefly held mistaken beliefs about the Holocaust, and had said "that Hitler never actually intended to massacre the Jews, he actually wanted to expel them to neighboring lands". Qadhi acknowledged that his views were wrong and said "I admit it was an error".[12] Qadhi added that he firmly believes "that the Holocaust was one of the worst crimes against humanity that the 20th century has witnessed" and that "the systematic dehumanization of the Jews in the public eye of the Germans was a necessary precursor" for that tragedy.[12]

Regarding Judaism, Qadhi has said: "I am not advising any Muslim to waste his time studying Judaism. But I am saying, why are Jews studying Islam? There is a reason. Not that they want to help us, they want to destroy us."[13]

In July 2010, Qadhi was selected to participate in an official delegation of U.S. imams and religious leaders to visit the concentration camps at Auschwitz and Dachau. The imams subsequently released a joint statement condemning anti-Semitism and labeling Holocaust denial as against the ethics of Islam.[14]

Books authored or co-authored

  • Riyaa: Hidden Shirk, 103 pages, Dar-al-Fatah, 1996, ISBN 8172317530
  • An introduction to the sciences of the Qura̓an, Al-Hidaayah Pub., 1999, ISBN 1-898649-32-4
  • An Explanation of the Four Principles of Shirk, 60 pages, with Muḥammad ibn ʻAbd al-Wahhāb, Al-Hidaayah, 2000, ISBN 1-898649-52-9
  • Du'a : The Weapon of the Believer, Al Hidaayah Publishing & Distribution, 2001, ISBN 1-898649-51-0
  • 15 Ways to Increase Your Earnings from the Quran and Sunnah, Al Hidaayah Publishing & Distribution, 2002, ISBN 1-898649-56-1
  • An explanation of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab's Kashf al-Shubuhat: a critical analysis of shirk, with Muḥammad ibn ʻAbd al-Wahhāb, Al-Hidaayah, 2003, ISBN 1-898649-62-6

See also

References

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External links

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