The ONE Decision That Changed Muslim History

Yasir QadhiAugust 17, 202646 min0 comments

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Muslim Decline & Reform Islamic History Wasatiyyah Ijtihad & Fiqh Knowledge & Scholarship Historiography Technology & Society Ottoman Empire

About this lecture

In this lecture, Shaykh Yasir Qadhi explores one of the most consequential decisions in Muslim history — the delayed adoption of the printing press — and uses it as a gateway to teach the discipline of historiography, the study of how history is interpreted across time. He traces the journey of paper and print from the Abbasid era through the Ottoman ban and Napoleon's arrival in Egypt, then examines multiple scholarly perspectives on who was really responsible for holding the Muslim world back. The lecture closes with a powerful call to move beyond "slogan Islam" and embrace the intellectual openness that characterized the early Muslim generations.

Shaykh Dr. Yasir Qadhi is one of the most influential Islamic scholars and intellectuals in the Western world. Born in Houston to Pakistani parents, he earned a degree in chemical engineering before studying for ten years at the Islamic University of Madinah, where he completed degrees in hadith and Islamic theology, and later earned a PhD in Religious Studies from Yale University. He served for years as Dean of Academic Affairs at AlMaghrib Institute, taught at Rhodes College in Memphis, and now serves as Dean of the Islamic Seminary of America and resident scholar of the East Plano Islamic Center (EPIC) in Texas. His lecture series on the seerah, "Lives of the Sahaba," and Islamic theology are among the most comprehensive in the English language.

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