In prophet Lot’s story in the Quran , it is said that when his people try to barge in and rape his guests (the angels ), he outright offered them his two daughters to rape instead which is something that I can’t really wrap my head around and can’t understand why it would be in any way considered better than the alternative and why the Quran would even mention that ?

The nature of Prophet’s Lot’s offering of his daughters is never made clear in the Quran. It’s usually interpreted as meaning that he was offering them in marriage, or that he was referring to all the women of his town as his “daughters”.

We know that Prophet Lot was under extreme psychological stress at this time, and that he felt overpowered:

He said, “If only I had the strength to stop you, or could rely on some strong support.” (The Quran, verse 11:80)

So it’s possible Prophet Lot himself didn’t know what he was offering them! We don’t know how many men there were among the attackers. If their number was greater than the number of Prophet Lot’s daughters, perhaps Prophet Lot thought that he could satisfy the chief men by marrying his daughters to them while also thinking that other women from the town can always be found for the rest.

For more on this please see this previous answer: Did God destroy the People of Lot for rape instead of homosexuality?

Assalam alaykum. I have a problem with wasting time, and I always say to my self “let me just finish this episode, and then i’ll Read Quran”. I use too much time in social media, and i’m not motivated at all. I want to be motivated, so I can be exited to read Quran, and to increase my knowledge. I hope you can help me. Jazakum Allah khair.

Alaikumassalam wa rahmatullah,

The lack of motivation can be due to a medical condition such as ADHD or depression, and without the right medications it may not be possible to have motivation for a person who suffers from such conditions. Another issue is impulsivity; people younger than 25 have not completed their brain development and are less able to manage their time, but once they get older they get better control.

Unfortunately I do not know of any solution for these issues. You can find many articles on the Internet for avoiding procrastination and being productive, but I doubt the efficacy of the solutions they provide.

Assalamualaikum I would like to know if a non-Quresh can become a leader of the Muslims

Alaikumassalam wa rahmatullah,

There are a few hadiths that say the caliphate is only for Quraysh. But since the caliphate no longer exists and since there is no strong evidence that it is obligatory on Muslims to have a caliphate, this is no longer relevant. The leader of a Muslim state can be from any tribe or ethnicity.

Recently I noticed that some muslims have somewhat different version of tashahhud recitation. Most of it is the same but some use different ending or so. Why is that so. Thanks

The reason is that different versions are transmitted in different hadiths and different scholars and schools (madhhabs) prefer different ones.

Hey assalamu alaikum I’ll forward some messages here from previous conversations with someone who gave me worse explanations

Alaikumassalam wa rahmatullah,

I broken up your question to address them individually.

there’s something called child support he pays money to support his family not to pay his supposed to be wife I feel worse about myself now so it’s true my actual purpose in life is to be my husband’s maid and sex slave?

Marriage is a contract between two equal partners. Your purpose in life is to do what is good for you and your family. You are not your husband’s property, maid or sex slave.

What about women’s shahadah(testimony) is half of men’s?

For this issue please see: Why men and women have different gender roles in Islam

Ok what about inheritance I know why is the man worth of 2 women’s value I know the reason but can it be applied in today’s world? And why does a daughter get only a part of her share if she doesn’t have a brother her share is taken by her fellow male family members ?

In the Islamic legal system, which still applies today, it is a man’s legal duty to take care of his wife and children. His larger share of inheritance is meant to help him with this duty. A woman has no such duty and her inheritance is entirely her own, while a man’s inheritance is divided between himself and his wife and children.

Ok how do I obey someone who’s not as smart as me?

It is your duty as a free person to choose a man who treats you the way you like to be treated. Islam does not force you to get married, and it does not force a certain type of man on you. If your husband makes unfair demands, you have the right to divorce.

The 4 wives thing isn’t really encouraged I know that but I heard that certain people are allowed to have sex with whoever they want like sultans.

Islamic law works to eradicate slavery and concubinage while tolerating it in societies that already practice it. For more on this see: Understanding Islam’s Sophisticated Approach to Slavery: Why Muslims Practiced Slavery in the Past, and Why They Reject it Today

And in surah al talaq there’s an ayah that proves pedophilia is halal I didn’t know that at all I thought they were referring to the pregnant al talaq verse4.

In colder countries women may not start menstruating until the ages of 16-18. Such women can still marry (including in Western countries) and they need this verse to tell them how to calculate their idda.

What about the eddah after the husbands death or after divorce why do I have to sit at home for 4 months and 10 days whereas he can marry the same day I died or the same day we divorce.. just think about it is having such authority possible in a mutual relationship?

One reason is to deal with the possibility that she may be pregnant. Islam does not want a pregnant woman to engage in sexual intimacy with a man other than the man who impregnated her. There may also be social reasons; society may function best when women do not immediately remarry after the death of their husbands.

Ok why is only him allowed to marry nonmuslim women and I not?

Because children are more likely to follow the religion of their fathers rather than their mothers. Muslim women married to non-Muslims are more likely to fail at passing Islam down to their children.

What about many and multiple hadiths that curse women who take care of their eyebrows, not wear hijab, the camel way of hijab.

Many of those hadiths are either fabricated or come to us from a single Companion, which means that they do not impart certain knowledge. You can ignore any single-Companion hadith that seems to conflict with Islamic ideals.

And tattoos are prohibited both for men and women yet only women with tattoos are the cursed ones.

The reason may simply be that only women used to practice tattooing at that time.

Men are still allowed to have 70 hoor al ain and not me. There me no equality there?

The 70-virgins hadith is not a reliable hadith. See Misquoting Muhammad by Jonathan Brown. As for women’s relationships in Paradise, we simply have no knowledge, and the vast majority of Muslim women are fine with the way things are. If you live piously you can trust God to give what makes you happy in the afterlife.

Also the same ayah that talks about the husband’s disobedience Allah says that we have to forgive him but if it’s us they have the right to degrade us it’s kind of degrading think about it it’s your spouse not your parent I searched about it and found some people saying that the verse doesn’t mean strike (hit) it means just ignore

God does not say to forgive such a husband, He says that the husband and wife should get arbitrators from their families to judge the issue. Regarding the wife-beating issue please see my essay: A new approach to the Quran’s “Wife-Beating Verse” (al-Nisa 4:34)

One last question ? If the husband doesn’t afford to pay his wife the obedience rule falls down right ? If I pay my own bills so we can be equal? I’ve always thought women are equal to men in Islam until I started arguing with many Islamophobes that sorted many of these things out to me I read about it I found they were true.I kept telling myself ofc there’s a hikma behind them and I just need to ask the right person.And I never had the courage to but now I did Look I really love my religion , I pray 5 times a day I’m a hafiz and I’m going to hajj this year so I really want to clear this up before I go.Look first I thought it’s just temporary thoughts and questions and I ignored them and now I realized they’re not just temporary as time goes, I feel worse about myself and I feel that women in Islam are less than men so that’s why I decided to seek answers

I think you are misunderstanding the issue of obedience. Your husband is not some lord over you who commands you. If he does that then you have married the wrong type of person. Your husband is your equal spiritually, and “obeying” him simply means that you do not do anything that would be a deal-breaker. You can make demands of him, if he demands something unfair you can tell him that, you can enlist the help of his family or your family, and you can threaten divorce. No Muslim woman should ever have to obey unfair demands from their husband or act like slaves for their husbands’ whims.

I live in Saudi Arabia and religious people there don’t believe in different mazhabs and they believe they have the right to continuously force me to wear niqbab or they’ll kick me out of tahfeez I really love memorizing the Quran it was my decision too but I just never read the verses regarding women in depth I’m sure there’s justice behind them that I don’t know about..I mean I rarely wore niqab there anyways look they’re not bad but they keep on talking about women in a really stupid way as if our purpose in life is to cover up from men because they’re some monsters or either please them after marriage .. other than that they’re really kind and good people

That’s entirely a problem with Saudi culture. If you go to the middle class of Iran, Turkey, Egypt or Malaysia, you will find that men and women are treated as equals and there is little of the problems you describe.

But there’s no Hadith that curses men it’s always women there’s even a Hadith حديث أبي هريرة  قال: قال رسول الله ﷺ: إذا دعا الرجل امرأته إلى فراشه فأبتْ فبات غضبان عليها لعنتها الملائكة حتى تصبح[1]، متفق عل that curses women who do not consent to sex .. can you please explain it? Because many people said Islam encourages marital rape what if it’s the opposite??

That’s a single-Companion hadith; such hadiths do not impart certain knowledge and can be safely ignored.

What’s the hikma behind this verse الرِّجَالُ قَوَّامُونَ عَلَى النِّسَاءِ بِمَا فَضَّلَ اللَّهُ بَعْضَهُمْ عَلَى بَعْضٍ وَبِمَا أَنْفَقُوا مِنْ أَمْوَالِهِمْ فَالصَّالِحَاتُ قَانِتَاتٌ حَافِظَاتٌ لِلْغَيْبِ بِمَا حَفِظَ اللَّهُ وَاللَّاتِي تَخَافُونَ نُشُوزَهُنَّ فَعِظُوهُنَّ وَاهْجُرُوهُنَّ فِي الْمَضَاجِعِ وَاضْرِبُوهُنَّ فَإِنْ أَطَعْنَكُمْ فَلَا تَبْغُوا عَلَيْهِنَّ سَبِيلًا إِنَّ اللَّهَ كَانَ عَلِيًّا كَبِيرًا Please a non misogynistic explanation.. do women have to hit slightly their disobedient husbands ?? And if no as expected why? He’s doing his responsibilities as a father he did nothing for his born baby other than child support so why does the woman have to obey them to the extent that he can hit her? I’ve even read hadiths that if women were to chose to prostrate to the sun or their husbands they should prostrate to their husbands? What’s so good about husbands and why are they that superior in this life and the hereafter?

Please see my essay: A new approach to the Quran’s “Wife-Beating Verse” (al-Nisa 4:34)

Why do humans always need to believe in something and why do humans incline to do good even it is not always easy?

I believe the answer to both questions might be that our souls recognize God’s presence, so they need to either accept Him or accept something else that helps them oppose Him. Humans incline toward good because God inspires us in that way, just as Satan inspires us to the opposite.

What are you views on people using anecdotes with a lot of mistakes and also pseudoscience to give dakwah or reminders. They will then say that their main point is to remind to do good deeds.

I believe that it is unacceptable to use any kind of falsehood for the sake of Islam. The first allegiance of every Muslim should be to the truth and nothing but the truth. So I completely opposed to that sort of thing and consider it not just morally wrong but harmful to Islam since it causes people to lose their respect for the religion when its leaders are willing to speak falsehoods and inaccuracies for the sake of some supposed greater good.

Why are 2 method of moving up our finger in swalaat? Some lift their finger up and then put in down. But some repeatedly lift it up and down till swalaat end

There are more than two methods. The reason is that we have many hadiths on this issue and they contain conflicting accounts of how the Prophet PBUH moved his fingers during the tashahhud. Different scholars preferred different narrations, so they came up with different views of how it should be done.

How do we finish things? Like I usually have a problem of finishing reading a book,after some time I get bored and just stop reading and completely abandoning the book. This also goes for everything else like trying to learn something.

Unfortunately your motivation to finish things is strongly influenced by the neurochemical balance in your brain. Some people suffer from conditions like ADHD or bipolar disorder which makes it extremely difficult for them to work on projects and have the motivation to go through with them. The only solution for such people is getting the right medication.

Stimulants like caffeine can help increase motivation, so you can try drinking coffee. But caffeine should be avoided after 2 PM because having it later than that will affect your sleep and decrease your motivation the next day.

You will also find many articles online on how to increase motivation and avoid procrastination, although personally I am highly skeptical of the solutions they offer. One thing that can help however is exercise; spending 30 minutes doing cardio exercise (such as on an exercise bike) and this can enhance your desire to read and get things done.

How to have barakah in all aspects of our life?

I believe the way to do that is to avoid sins and to dedicate a certain amount of time everyday to extra worship, such as reading the Quran for an hour everyday. Reading the Quran helps you avoid sins, correct character defects, and recognize the best way to worship God and speak to Him. By dedicating an hour to the Quran everyday you can actualize the true Quranic spirit in yourself, realizing that you are meant to act like one of the Prophets mentioned in the Quran; working for God and making pleasing Him your first priority in life. Once you are fully dedicated to God then God will take care of all of your needs and will place His blessings into every hour of your day inshaAllah.

Do you support a government based on technocracy? Is there a type of government that is compatible with all types of cultures? Is there anything that could displace democracy?

Technocracy can be democratic or otherwise. If a group of scientists seize power and force their views on the population, that would be technocracy. I do not support such a government since technological solutions are only one of the essential needs of the population. A government that is only focused on technology is going to lack other essential things in its worldview, such as moral values.

I believe that allowing people to have a say in how their government works is an essential right, so the governments would have some element of democracy. But democratic systems can be very different depending on the way they governance system works. A democracy in which the president has all of the power is going to be very different from a democracy where the parliament has equal power to the president.

It is extremely difficult to come up with ways to improve reasonably functioning democracies like those of Britain and the US because whatever change we suggest will likely have many unforeseen consequences. Humans are extremely complex as anyone who has run a business knows, there are all kinds of clashes of interest and belief.

Have you ever heard a saying attributed to Islam that goes(i'm paraphrasing):"Whoever that does not have a teacher, satan is his teacher". What are your thoughts on that?

I have heard that saying, it is usually used to justify having students submit to the authority of a shaykh in Sufi circles. It is meant to reinforce the Sufi idea that the shaykh/teacher is central to the spiritual growth of the student and that spiritual growth cannot be sought independently without submitting to the authority of the Sufi organizational system.

My view is that the saying is ridiculous and has no basis in Islam. It is great to have good teachers. But there is nothing in Islam that requires us to submit to the authority of a shaykh/teacher as if there can be no learning or growth outside of them. I support egalitarianism (equality) between students and teachers. Teachers are simply students who have learned more.

Salam alaikum. Does Islam permit pre-wedding photography?

Alaikumassalam wa rahmatullah,

There is no issue with such photography as long as the couple are not alone together and as long as there is no touching between them. However, a couple can perform their Islamic engagement ceremony (nikāḥ) before the wedding. If they do that, then they can do anything that a married couple do in photos without issue.

Have you heard of the 'Law of Attraction'? What are your thoughts on it?

I watched the documentary The Secret which speaks of that. It was little more than pseudo-scientific theorizing with no firm basis. So if there is a Law of Attraction, I would only believe in it once there are empirical studies confirming it.