0:06 Peace be upon you, welcome all my dear friends, I am Hussein Al-Khalil and this is the Think Again podcast, Allah the Almighty says: “And those who do not invoke with Allah another [person] or kill the soul which Allah has forbidden [to be killed], except by right, and do not commit unlawful sexual intercourse - and whoever should do that will meet a penalty.” And in another verse: “And do not approach unlawful sexual intercourse. Indeed, it is ever an immorality and an evil way.” And He also said: “The adulterer and the adulteress - flog each of them with 100 lashes. And let not pity for them detain you in the religion of Allah, if you should believe in Allah and the Last Day. And let a party of the believers witness their punishment.”
0:54 We have learned one concept that everyone memorizes, that adultery is having sex outside of marriage. It is one concept with no second, but when we follow the context of the verses and believe that there is a correspondence in the Quran, we find ourselves in a problem of correspondence, as Allah the Almighty mentioned to us the unlawful practice in many verses and referred to it as committing an immoral act. So if adultery and committing an immoral act have the same meaning, we fall into the problem of correspondence, which is one of the basic problems in contemplating the Book of Allah. What is adultery? Is it related to forbidden sex in the Arabic language? If practicing sex outside of
1:45 marriage is called adultery, not fornication. Adultery comes from fornication and exaggeration in slander, falsehoods and lies, to the point that we use it in our lives when we say a woman is an adulteress, meaning she drives her husband crazy with a lot of talk and incitement, she keeps fornicating with him and making him go down on his head. But where did we get this concept from? What is our evidence for it? The answer is simply from the Quran. When we read the verses in terms of context, we will understand completely that God never means sexual intercourse when He talks about adultery. I will address the subject of sexual intercourse in a little while after I finish with the
2:34 concept of adultery. God Almighty says: “And those who, when they spend, are neither extravagant nor niggardly but are between that a medium (way) [toward] Allah. And those who do not invoke with Allah another deity or kill the soul which Allah has forbidden, except by right, and do not commit unlawful sexual intercourse. And whoever should do that will surely meet his sins. Double for him the punishment on the Day of Resurrection, and he will abide therein in humiliation.” If we ask ourselves, what brought about adultery if it is practicing sex? Among these things that have no relation, neither near nor far, to an innate issue, sex is first and last an innate issue, but what is the
3:20 appropriateness of mentioning adultery in the verse you mentioned? Extravagance, miserliness, and supplication to other than God, which is polytheism, and killing a soul unjustly, all of which are harmful to society. Why would God Almighty place an innate issue among them and punish its perpetrators with a severe punishment that doubles his torment on the Day of Resurrection and he will remain in it humiliated forever? What is the great crime that the person committed while we are talking? If it was sex, then what crime did he commit simply by having sex with another party with his consent and inside closed rooms without any compulsion from either party so that God Almighty would place them
4:11 with the slain and polytheists? There must be another issue other than what you understand and exaggerate for us. To confirm that when we read the context of the verses in Surat An-Nur when our Lord began it by saying: “The adulterer and the adulteress, flog each of them with 100 lashes, and let not pity for them detain you in the religion of God,” we find that the Surah is talking about… Lying, slander, and accusing people of falsehood in order to tarnish their reputation. This is closer to the meaning that adultery is adultery, i.e. slander and false and fabricated news. We find that the verses that directly follow talk about accusing chaste, unaware women of adultery and about men accusing their
5:02 wives of false news that may be true or fabricated. So God demanded four witnesses to prove the truth of what they said about their wives, otherwise they would be flogged 80 times because of their lies and slander. And immediately after that came the well-known story of the thousands of jaws, which I talked about in a previous episode so as not to repeat the same words. We find then that the verses have the same meaning, where God Almighty says: “When you receive it with your tongues and say with your mouths that of which you have no knowledge and you think it is insignificant while it is, in the sight of God, tremendous. And why did you not, when you heard it, say: ‘It is not for us to
5:54 speak of this. Glory be to You! This is a tremendous slander.’ God admonishes you not to return to the like of it ever, if you are believers.” So we note, my dear friends, that the surah that God began after the first verse English: The threat to the adulterer and adulteress revolves around fabricated stories, inventions, false news, gossip and rumors. So what brought the subject of sex into this? When we understand this subject well, we will know exactly why God emphasized the punishment for adultery and placed it alongside polytheism and murder, and promised its perpetrators double punishment in the afterlife and punishment and public shaming in this
6:42 world in His saying, “And let a party of the believers witness their punishment.” Then He placed them in the same category as the polytheists when He spoke about their sexual intercourse, because this subject destroys entire nations. By God, two people had sex in a moment of recklessness, temptation, weakness or deprivation, and then God Almighty comes and orders us to flog them, disgrace them in public, tarnish their reputation, destroy them psychologically and ostracize them socially. All this just because they committed an obscenity in a moment of weakness or temptation, which is originally human nature. How can He make it an
7:28 innate issue in a person and then punish him with flogging and public shaming in this world, which leads to his isolation, social ostracism and lack of compassion? And the most severe punishments in the afterlife, while consuming the wealth of an orphan, a polytheist, or an oppressor were not punished with this punishment, God did not command that these people be punished in front of people and that they be disgraced, i.e. the oppressor, the polytheist, and the consuming of the orphan’s wealth, but rather this punishment in public, if we understand it as sexual intercourse, makes God appear unjust. How is this? I will tell you, let’s suppose that two people had sex and God’s punishment was carried out on them by
8:17 flogging in public and they were disgraced. The consequences of this act, i.e. the public punishment, which is disgrace, will be on the perpetrator and his family. The girl’s family will be psychologically harmed by the actions of their daughter. Her father will walk around with his head bowed in front of people because of the actions of their daughter. Her mother, likewise, will not marry her sisters because of what their sister did. The entire family was punished because of a crime they did not commit. Is it Almighty, would wrong an entire family because of the actions of one individual, when He says, “No soul shall bear the burden of another.”
9:07 Is the religion of Islam the religion of concealment or the religion of scandal? Certainly, it is the religion of concealment, and even in… Committing an immorality When he said, “And those of your women who commit an immorality,” he did not order that they be disgraced, but rather he said, “Contain them in houses until death takes them or Allah ordains for them a way (to escape from Hell).” So it is a grave matter that a girl who committed a forbidden act in a moment of weakness and temptation without harming anyone be disgraced, and her punishment should be flogging, defamation, ostracism from society, and a bad reputation. girl who has reached this point is destined to commit suicide, no doubt, and it has happened, unfortunately, we often
9:59 hear about cases of girls committing suicide for this reason, that she is accused of sex in order to tarnish her reputation, and she may be innocent. Someone might come and say, “If we go along with you and agree that adultery comes from adultery, meaning false news, rumors, and fabrications,” then nothing has changed because the punishment of flogging and defamation has not changed, and it is in itself defamation, even if the two people, or the girl, for example, practice lying and spreading rumors. So I say, first, the crime of lying, slander, and rumors fell on the girl, since we gave an example of the girl, so its impact is lighter than the impact of the crime of… Prostitution is better for her
10:52 when she hears that so-and-so is caught in a case of spreading false and misleading news. It is easier for her to hear that she is caught in a case of prostitution. Our society, thank God, is an angelic society that does not show mercy, especially in sex cases. It only takes a word to exaggerate the story and make it into a chain. Her hair looks bad, she goes from one man to another, every day she is in a man’s arms. Come on, shut them up and they make up stories that did not happen. The poor thing did this with a man she loved and trusted after he promised to marry her. Of course, what she did was wrong and unjustified, so that no one can say that I am
11:40 justifying her. It is possible that she repented to God for this action and did not return to it after she discovered the lie of the shaw, but the accusation will remain with her even after death. Do you think that God is pleased with this injustice at a time when He is not pleased with a murderer, nor one who eats the orphan’s money, nor anyone else? God forbid that. Secondly, when you say that the punishment for defamation will continue to haunt her even if she fabricated misleading news, I say that she deserves it, yes she deserves it. How many people were harmed by her slander? How many women were divorced from their husbands and deprived of their
12:29 children because of her false and misleading news with the aim of separating spouses? How many families that lived a quiet and stable life were destroyed because of her false slander? When we say that she deserves this because her actions harmed society and the punishment is of the same kind as the action, this defamation will only affect her and her father, mother, sisters, or anyone else will not be harmed by it. This is justice. God cannot punish an entire family for the crime of one individual. By God Almighty, by God, they did not appreciate God properly when they forgot to attribute this
13:18 act to God by ordering the defamation of people, even though our religion is the religion of concealment. The one who engages in sex, especially a girl, and is flogged and defamed in public is like someone who has condemned her to destruction and the destruction of her family, and her only sin, as I said, is that she engaged in sex with someone she loves in a moment of recklessness after he promised to marry her. Well, someone may come and say that the punishment is not originally carried out except by four witnesses. And since it has been proven that there were four witnesses This means that she is indifferent and openly commits this sin and therefore deserves punishment or they deserve punishment in the first place. I
14:07 say again that your words are wrong because God did not ask for four witnesses in adultery but in accusing chaste women. four witnesses when he talked about adultery but in accusing chaste women and husbands of their wives when he said: “And those who accuse chaste women but do not produce four witnesses - flog them with eighty lashes.” For your information, accusing or accusing chaste women is not limited to the subject of sex, but may be very far from the concept of sex. Where did they get it from? The verse that says: “And those who accuse chaste women but do not produce four witnesses -
15:00 witnesses except themselves - the testimony of one of them is four testimonies by God that he is among the truthful.” Where did they get that what is meant by these verses is marital infidelity? God did not mention immorality in it, or in other words, He did not limit the subject to immorality only. It may be Accusing chaste women or wives of spreading false news and stories with the aim of causing trouble and separation between two spouses, because the existence of the four witnesses may be impossible if the issue is related to sex, because it is obvious and logical in the case of marital infidelity that it takes place behind
15:54 not think that there is a sane woman who would do this thing in public, while when the issue is about lies and fabricating rumors, the existence of the four witnesses is logical, as if one of the women heard it or someone heard her say this in front of them or the like, or a group of people heard it. On the other hand, when the husband accuses his wife of marital infidelity and he is certain or almost certain, he divorces her immediately and does not wait for witnesses to be brought, and the issue is not even in his mind. Imagine a man who caught his wife in the act and he does not have witnesses, what does he do? He goes and swears that she did it and she swears that he is a liar in order to clear herself and the matter is over and the
16:45 magic turns against the magician, meaning he is the one who is at fault and deserves 80 lashes. This matter is a mockery of the mind when it is manipulated in the books of jurisprudence in this way. As soon as he exposes her, he immediately goes and divorces her, of course, if he did not kill her. If he did not kill her in order to wash away his shame and honor as he claims, the four witnesses are for accusing chaste women of adultery, not for fornication. Even in accusing chaste women of adultery, the matter is not limited and restricted to sex, rather there is a logical concept that I can deduce from the Quran that strengthens this concept as well, which is the concept of adultery, which is the Almighty’s saying: the adulteress and the adulterer. If what was meant was
17:32 sex, God would have sufficed by saying adulterous acts, because the sexual act is natural and self-evident for it to be between two parties, a man and a woman. It is natural for him to have a partner in this act. If what was meant was sex, the verse would have been redundant, and the entire Quran is free of redundancies. Why does he say the adulteress and the adulterer when he can abbreviate it with the word adulterers, because we understand that The punishment is for both parties, but when the adulterer and adulteress are mentioned, this means that the act may be committed by one party without the other, or it may be committed by two parties. This strengthens the concept that adultery is adultery, i.e.
18:26 false news, fabrications, and rumors. The crime is committed by each person separately. It may be committed by a man alone, or it may be committed by a woman. This is also strengthened in the punishment of the thief when God Almighty said: “And the male thief, male thief, cut off their hands.” He mentioned “male thief, female thief,” meaning that the crime of theft is committed by a woman and a man, or both of them may commit it. When God mentions the two parties in a crime or in an act, this indicates that the crime may be committed by one party without the other. For this reason, God said “the adulterer and the adulteress” instead of “the
19:14 adulterer.” Here we understand that the subject has nothing to do with sex. Well, if we agree that the subject is adultery, i.e. false news, rumors, and fabrications, we ask ourselves: Is this degree, this crime, big? I mean, it is just rumors and false news that deserve it. They commit painful torture and are tortured in front of people and are talked about and humiliated forever. The answer is yes and I will tell you why this crime, my dear friends. It destroys women, it destroys men, it destroys families as I said a
20:00 little while ago, it destroys societies and finally it destroys entire countries. I will explain to you when a man marries the woman he loves and who loves him and they live a peaceful and dignified life and this husband’s family and relatives cannot stand this wife and want to cause discord between them. The adultery begins, the adultery begins from them towards the husband. This is strange, this does not resemble us, this is not from our tribe, not from our clan, not from our level. I heard talk about her, God forbid, she goes out with her hair loose. This has a dark past. She does not know what to do after she leaves for work. They heap upon her a huge amount of
20:49 accusations, fabrications and false news and they repeat their adultery continuously whenever they meet with him to the point that the husband has reached his limit with her and can no longer bear their adultery and his subconscious mind begins to interact with this news to believe it. Especially if his mind is two nuts that will come out until the situation reaches divorce. He might divorce her just to get rid of the gossip and their fornication, so the separation between these two spouses occurred due to false and misleading news, so this family was destroyed, and the biggest disaster is if they have children, they will be, along with their mother and
21:39 father, victims of these slanders. A girl lives in a society dominated by ignorance and backwardness, and those who see their honor between women’s thighs, and some want to tarnish her reputation in order to harm her because she did not agree to marry a certain person or for any other reason, so they will spread their fornication in society and slander her with things that did not happen, and she is innocent of everything that was said about her, and society, by its nature, will not confirm the truth of this news and will believe what is said about her if the talk in all parts of the world or in all parts of society is based on the principle of “there is no smoke without fire.” What will the result be? The
22:31 result is the destruction of the girl's life and she may end up committing suicide when she sees, unfortunately, that society believed what they heard about her without verifying the news. People just want one rumor and then see how it spreads in society like wildfire. Of course, that is if her family members are not killed so that they can wash away their honor as they claim. The punishment in itself is a deterrent to anyone who dares to spread false news and rumors that harm people. Those who are punished in public will be a lesson to others. They will
23:20 also be defamed so that people will be wary of them and not believe them later. This is the best solution with this group, to warn against them and make them known publicly. I can deduce from these verses that this is the punishment for the liar who seeks to spread discord in society. Adultery, my dear friends, is destroying an entire country, Iraq, neighboring Iraq, brotherly Iraq, was destroyed and its land was violated because of adultery, because of the amount of false and misleading news about it and the media campaign against it from all satellite channels, they all agreed on it with a
24:13 fierce media campaign, they started to spread rumors day and night that this country possesses weapons of mass destruction, and the result, what is it? Hundreds of thousands of innocent victims and many times that number of wounded, injured and missing, and the theft and plunder of the country's wealth. In the end, the civilized West admitted that the invasion of Iraq was due to fake news. all saw how this virus was exaggerated in all media outlets. From the first moment the Corona virus appeared, the media turned into a huge machine working to spread fear and
25:01 panic among people. It was not just press coverage of a global event, but rather a systematic campaign to program the human subconscious mind that the virus is deadly and dangerous, although the numbers and facts did not support this exaggeration. The media was practicing adultery by publishing the numbers of infections and deaths on a daily basis without referring to or focusing on the high recovery rate or the fact that most of the infected were suffering from mild symptoms. This approach made people focus only on the negative side, ignoring the full picture. The
25:47 spotlight was on the crowded hospitals and the infected in intensive care rooms, while millions of cases that recovered easily or did not appear were ignored. It has symptoms originally, the use of terms such as the deadly pandemic, the killer virus, and the deadly wave became part of the daily media discourse, which planted the idea in people’s minds that infection means inevitable death, although the death rate was not high compared to other diseases. Every day, on all channels and in all news bulletins, there was continuous coverage of the Corona virus, which made
26:35 people live in a state of constant alert until the fear of the virus became part of the collective subconscious of humanity. May God have mercy on everyone who died. Glory be to God, it spread throughout the world without exception. Because of this media exaggeration, people became afraid to even get close to others, and the mask turned into a symbol of terror, and the person who coughs or sneezes is as if he is carrying death in his pocket. All of this is due to deliberate media adultery that changed the way people think about the disease, to the point that they imposed stupid measures, by God, stupid and naive, to limit, as they said, the
27:21 spread of the virus, such as social distancing. I mean, in the mosque, there is a meter between the worshipper and another, but as soon as the prayer is over, they all gather at the door to go out. It is normal for a family to go By car to a park, for example, they sit apart so that no one transmits the infection to the other, and as soon as they finish their session, they get in the car together and it's normal. Yes, seriously, these are naive measures. It is not the Corona virus that created the real crisis, but the media that exaggerated the issue until people live in a state of constant terror. But what is the reason for this adultery? The reason is the vaccines that they forced us to take, which caused complications for many
28:14 people. Perhaps the issue is commercial, or perhaps something else that I do not know. In the end, the Corona adultery ended in one moment after the war broke out between Russia and Ukraine. Glory be to God, the media that was bothering us with Corona day and night in one moment forgot about Corona and took over the Russian- Ukrainian war. This is the concept of adultery. Do you believe, my dear friends? Do you believe that God imposes a strict punishment like the punishment for adultery just because two people committed an instinctive act that did not harm anyone? Certainly not, God Almighty focuses on crime, corruption
29:02 and harming people, and real adultery is one of the greatest sins that harm societies as a whole. Thus, the meaning is correct when we read why God made adultery a severe sin and placed it with killing a soul and associating partners with God, and promised its perpetrators double the punishment on the Day of Judgment and social punishment such as flogging and its equivalent in front of a mirror and all ears. God forbid that He would impose this punishment because of committing an innate matter that He placed in humans. As for practicing sex, God mentioned it as committing an indecency, and indecency in the obscenity indicates ugliness, severity and going beyond the acceptable and familiar limits. The word is
29:51 used in adultery in the sense that I mentioned in this episode, and it is also used in sex and in other places that have no relation to these things, meaning that the concept of indecency is not limited to sex or adultery, but we understand the meaning through the context. For example, when He wanted to refer to sex related to homosexuality, He said: “And those of your women who commit an indecency,” and He also said: “And Lot, when he said to his people: ‘Do you come to…’” :No one before you has committed an immorality. Here, he spoke about sex and referred to committing an immorality, but he did not mention adultery. Here, we must be careful so that some people do not get confused
30:41 or so that some people do not catch on to practicing sex outside of marriage. It is explicitly forbidden in the verses. Adultery has nothing to do with sex. Yes, but this does not mean that sex outside of marriage or homosexuality is permissible, rather it is forbidden, as evidenced by the Almighty’s saying: “Say, ‘My Lord has only forbidden immoralities - such of them as are apparent and such as are invalid.’” So, we must be careful so that some people do not get confused. When he wanted to point out the false news that is far from sex, he said: “And do not come near adultery. Indeed, it is ever an immorality and an evil way.” That is, do not spread false and misleading news and rumors that lead to injustice to people and society, and do not even come near or
31:32 sit with those who have this characteristic. Here, we note that the punishment on the Day of Resurrection is not limited to those who spread rumors and false news, but even to those who promote them, because they are partners in the crime if they do it with malicious intentions. When he wanted to point out the subject of marriage, he said: “And do not marry those who…” Your fathers married women, except for what has already occurred. Indeed, it was an immorality and detestable and an evil way. Here we are talking about a marriage contract and the subject has nothing to do with adultery or even sex outside of marriage. However, Allah called it an immorality, but all illicit sex is an immorality because it is out of the norm and
32:23 socially unacceptable. Well, Allah the Almighty pointed to illicit sex and called it an immorality, which is what is currently known as homosexuality, through the verses that I mentioned a little while ago. Here, female with female, and the verse after that, male with male, when He said: “And those of you who commit it,” and also the people of Lot, when He said: “Indeed, you commit an immorality such as no one before you has committed before from among the worlds.” Well, where is the mention of the female with the man, meaning the natural practice, female and man, not female with female and male with male? He pointed to it in a general way in the verse that I mentioned a little while ago when He said: “
33:11 Say: ‘My Lord has only forbidden immoralities - what is apparent of them and what is concealed’” because all illicit sex is considered an immorality, to the point that we use the word in our lives when we say so-and-so He is extremely wealthy, meaning he has money that is beyond the ordinary and reasonable. Not all indecency is related to sex, but we understand the meaning through the context. Adultery has nothing to do with sex, neither closely nor remotely. This is our topic for today. May you always be well. Peace be upon you. [Music]
