Live Free with Josh Howerton - Canceled Historian EXPOSES the Truth About Islam | Live Free with Josh Howerton

Episode Date: July 16, 2026

Was everything you learned about the Crusades wrong? Why has the history of Christianity and Islam been so misunderstood? And what can history teach us about today's cultural and geopolitical challenges? In this episode of LIVE FREE, Pastor Josh Howerton sits down with historian and bestselling author Raymond Ibrahim for a thought-provoking conversation about the history of Christianity and Islam, the Crusades, the rise of Islamic empires, religious persecution, and the way history shapes our understanding of today's world. Together, they examine common misconceptions about the Crusades, discuss how historical narratives influence modern culture, explore the persecution of Christians throughout history, and consider how Christians should think biblically about history, religious freedom, immigration, and engaging their neighbors with both truth and love. Whether you've wrestled with questions about the Crusades, Islamic history, Western civilization, or the role of Christians in today's culture, this conversation challenges listeners to pursue truth with wisdom, humility, and a biblical worldview. In this episode you'll discover: What really sparked the Crusades—and why history is often misunderstood. How historical narratives shape modern culture and politics. The history of Christian persecution in the Middle East. How Christians can think biblically about Islam while loving their Muslim neighbors. Why understanding history matters for faithfully following Christ today. Stand firm. Think biblically. Live free. 🧢 Want a Live Free hat of your own? Visit LiveFree.shop 📲 Looking to grow deeper in your faith? Check out the Lakepointe App to access our Discipleship Guide, daily Bible reading plan, and more. Text APP to 20411 to download

The real story of Islam and the West or Christianity is not what we were told. Once upon a time, there were zero Muslim nations, and now there's 50. Well, that happens somehow. Any one of these stories, by the way, if it was the opposite, if it was a Christian, doing this to a Muslim, it'd be everywhere. Everyone would know. Well, hey, Lifree Nation, before we jump into the episode, this podcast is recorded right here at Lake Point Church in Dallas, Texas.

But the Liv Free Nation is spread all over the country and all around the world. So if you've been watching and thinking, man, I wish I could be prepared. part of something like this, we want to invite you to take a simple next step and that is join us for church online. Every weekend we stream our services live on YouTube, Facebook, and our church online platform, and it's more than just watching a service. There are a live host in the chat, prayer teams ready to stand with you, and people all around the world worshiping together in real time. And so whether you're exploring the faith, coming back to church or just looking for a place to start, church online is a great way to jump in and experience what God is doing here at Lake Point. We would love to see you in the chat this weekend.

And now, enjoy the podcast. Raymond Ibrahim, welcome to live free. Thanks for having me, Joshua. Happy to be with you. This is great. So for listeners, I just want to tell you, like, one of the coolest things about this, the podcast kind of doing what it's done, is I was telling you beforehand, when I read something that I really like, I can actually get a hold of the guy. That's a good thing. Yeah, it is.

That's what happened with you. So honestly, I'm just going to tell everybody how I found out of it. about you and then heads up for people that are listening we're about to have a very interesting discussion on the history of Islam I think some of you guys probably like me when I read Raymond's book are going to get pulled out of the matrix and then talk about how some of those things intersect with what's going on in society now here's how I got introduced to you and I want to thank you I sleep terrible so I usually wake up between like two and four and I read military history.

That was the first book I read, Sword and Cemetery. So I'm going to toss this up here for people who read like me. That book was unbelievable. I couldn't put that thing down. Thank you. And I'm here in a second.

I'm going to ask you what it was about and all that stuff. Then I got a hold of that guy. This is Defenders of the West. That book is hard. That's an awesome book. It's like vignettes of primarily guys during the Crusades.

Yeah. Yeah. So one of the fun facts for me was discovering that Vlad the Impaler, the guy that Count Dracula is based on, was one of the defenders of the West. So I may ask you about that. Of course, please. That's a big one. Yeah. So here's where I want to go.

There's a few things I want to ask you about. One, I want to talk to you about the Crusades and kind of the vibe I picked up in high school that it was all evil, racist Christians. You just want to colonize people. I want to talk to you real quick about the rise of Islam in Europe and the United States. United States. We're seeing this a lot in Dallas and like, man, how should we and maybe should we not think about that kind of stuff? I definitely, I have been waiting to ask you this question. I definitely want to talk to you about what I feel like is the weird alliance between progressivism and Islam that makes no sense to most people. It makes no sense to most people. But first,

can you just tell me a little bit about yourself and why you have canceled in your YouTube bio? All right. Well, thanks, Josh. And I'm really happy to hear that you liked these books and we'll talk about them. The reason it says canceled in my bio is because I actually have been around for quite some time. I started writing and publishing and all that sort of thing soon after 9-11. And in the context of 9-11, right around 9-11, I finished my master's thesis, which was about the first military encounter between Muslims and Christians, the Battle of Yarmouk. So obviously, I had an interest in that. That was around the late 90s, right around 2000. And from that point on, I actually continued graduate school. I went to Georgetown University in D.C.

Because at the time, they had, you know, what was taught it as a great Arab studies program, Islamic studies. Of course, I learned the hard way and we can get into what I learned in academia. But long story short, it left a, you know, bad taste in my mouth and I was about to leave. But I got a job and internship at the Library of Congress in the Near East section. Library of Congress has its largest library in the world. It's amazing and fascinating, especially if you work there because you can go behind the scenes and most people can't get into the stacks. I could. And long story short, I was working with Arabic language books and I came across writings by Al Qaeda, which was a topic back then.

Okay, this is, I came across these maybe 2004. And they were writings by Osama bin Laden in Arabic and Amin Zawahri, who were at the time first and second leaders of al-Qaeda. Long story short, I got it actually. a book deal to translate these and basically annotate them and explain them. And they came out finally in 2007 by Doubleday. It's the Al-Qaeda reader. And the whole point of that book was to show you that before I came across this stuff and translated it, Al-Qaeda was actually sending communiquez to the West, and the West was

happily disseminating it, the media, BBC, CNN. And everything Al-Qaeda would say was, we attacked you because you attacked us. It's all about reciprocal treatment. You respect us, we'll respect you. And it listed grievances, you know, endless mountains of grievances, from the crusades to the colonial era, to Israel, two teddy bears named Mahmahad. Okay. Yeah, really, okay.

Like, that's real? That's real. Okay. Yeah, you're mocking our prophet. To the Kyoto Protocol, the environment. So it was just as long, it was very, it was tailor made to a Western audience, and it was very intelligible to Western audience because, oh, yeah, we're bad. Because, of course, the West is conditioned to thinking it's bad.

I want to ask you about that. Yeah, that's a huge theme. That's what I call the enabler of everything. But then what I came across in Arabic was the same Bin Laden and Aminzwahri writing in Arabic to Muslims. And it was a completely different message now. It was, oh, we have to hate them because of who they are. Oh, we have to do jihad.

And these are kufar infidels. Oh, they're the enemies no matter what they do. Okay. It was a completely different message. Wait, I want to understand you right. So, wait, you're saying the same communiques were getting translated one way by public media, but the actual translations were different? No, no.

He was sending communiques directly to the West and probably in Arabic and Western media would translate it. But then he wrote books in Arabic to fellow Muslims, not sent to the West, okay, in the Arab world. Ah, yeah. Right. And that's what I came across and found. It wasn't even cataloged yet. It was in the Library of Congress. And I read it and I was just amazed.

I was like, wow, because I can read Arabic. I was like, he's saying all this and nobody knows? You know, where's the CIA? Where's the intelligence community? You know, I'm some guy who's like, I was in my early 30s and, you know, just in graduate school. Anyway, so I translated it. And that was the big revealer at the time was kind of like, oh, look at the, you know,

he's the double speak from these Islamic groups, right? So anyway, I tell you all that, that's a long story. story just to tell you how I got into this whole field. But then I was working at the Library of Congress, like I said, and I was helping the Congressional Research Department and that sort of thing. And then eventually I just, and I started writing about another topic that's near and dear to me, which is Muslim persecution of Christians. By background, I'm a Coptic Christian, which is the indigenous Christians, indigenous natives actually of Egypt who were Christian before Egypt got conquered and Islamized in the 7th century. So I've had an obvious interest. That's why I've always had an interest

in the nexus between Muslim, Islam, and Christianity. That's why I wrote my thesis about what I did. So one of the topics was the persecution of Christians. I ended up writing my next book about that came out in 2013 called Crucified Again. And I still actually, every month, I write reports for the Gatesstone Institute since 2011, monthly reports about what happens every month to Christians at the hands of Muslims. And you'd be surprised because, because these reports are long and they get longer and longer, and they range from just slaughter left and right, especially in Africa, okay?

Church is being desecrated, burned, ritually, blasphemers and apostates, Muslims who want to become Christians, getting attacked and killed by their family, imprisoned, that sort of thing. And any one of these stories, by the way, if it was the opposite, if it was a Christian, doing this from a Muslim,

it'd be everywhere. Everyone would know. It would be everywhere. These stories, nobody knows it. Okay. I'm going to ask you a second one. why you think that is. Okay. You go ahead. Yeah. And I'm just, I'm fast forward and give you a quick recap of who and what I am and why I do this. And then at that point, I became basically just

a professional writer, a fellow at various think tanks. And that's when I started going back to my original interest, history, which is what I studied in college. My professor, by the way, you know, Victor Davis Hansen. Yeah, I love reading this stuff. Yeah, okay. I love reading his stuff. And so, yeah, he was, yeah, exactly. That's why I got into military history because he was my professor at the time. He started doing military history, right? Yeah, yeah. At the time that I started my MAA thesis with him, which was about the Battle of Yarmouk, he was writing the book, The Carnage and Culture. So there was a lot of symbiotic kind of, I think I even helped a little bit of research for him at the time as we were like interns a little bit,

some of the students. Anyway, so I've been writing now back to the history because I find that much more fascinating. When we talk about Islam, for example, example, in the al-Qaeda reader, I talked about the doctrine of Islam. And a lot of people talk about the problematic doctrines of Islam. And I think that's good. I do it too. What no one had really done before me was to show you the historical manifestation of these doctrines, because that's a lot harder to do. It's easy to memorize, you know, 10 verses in the Quran, which are anti-infidel, et cetera, and we all talk about it all the time. It's a lot harder to actually dig into the sources and find out what happened, especially, as I found out, when

the secondary sources, what we call secondary sources, historians, I'm a secondary history. So primary sources are, you know, as close as you can get to the events, eyewitnesses, hopefully, maybe not, but whatever is closest to it. Those are the original primary sources. Secondary sources is someone like me. I take them supposedly and I write a book, a modern day book, and that's what you find in Barnes & Noble, right, or wherever, and you read it. Now, when I consulted those books, those history books that were written by the professors, they said what we're going to talk about, which is, you know, the Crusaders

were just evil white racists and colonialists. That's like the whole vibe, my whole childhood vibe. Me too. But because I did consult, especially when I was at the Library of Congress, and I had all this access to books and chronicles, and I took a lot of time. That book, Sword and Smitar, the first one that came out in 2018, even though it came out in 2018,

much of the research was done during the years when I was at the Library of Congress and had really great access, which I still do. Anyway, so what I started finding is that the real story of Islam and the West or Christianity is not what we were told. Yeah, that's why I figured out real fast reading your book. Right.

And you keep going. And that's why I felt like, okay, I need to, I need, people need to know this, okay? Because like I said, again, if you understand the historical method, you have primary sources is what it's all about. This is what we, this is the facts, as good as we can get them. Secondary sources is a synthesis by an academic and a scholar who supposedly has put it together for you so you can understand. And like I said, those were, not only were they not doing justice, they were literally saying the opposite of what had happened. So when I started looking at these chronicles and also in Arabic, also, you know, so all the different languages, Muslims and Christians, it was a completely different story.

It was, excuse me. And so maybe it's best now to tell you, you know, like the beginning of all this, the historical beginning. So is this how you got canceled? Oh, the canceled question. You're right. I got canceled because when the Al-Qaeda reader came out, the first book in 2007, I was invited to all the – I was on CNN and NPR, like even the very liberal, you know, leftist NPR and PBS and things like that. And they'd have me on to talk about it. But then eventually I started just, I didn't even think of it at that like I'm shifting gears.

I just was saying the truth, you know, in my mind. And it just, before long, I was kind of like gone. And then social media did some weird stuff on me where I completely, no one would ever see me. And there would be like, we don't even leave you, you got to a point where I would Google, you know, if you Google the title of an article, it'll come up at least. Mine wouldn't. Shadow banned. Yeah, exactly. I was totally shadow banned.

And I went on for a while. But and that's, which was maybe in retrospect good, because that's when I started really focusing on the books, which is what I enjoy. And didn't you get invited to speak at some military thing and then like care or somebody like, what was that deal? Well, sword and simitar. I've been nerding out on your stuff for a couple of years. Cool. No, right. Sword and Simitar, the book we're talking, the first book that came out in 2018.

By 2019, the U.S. Army War College, someone had read it and they wanted me to come give a presentation on it. then care that that acronym is so cloying care like they care they're really terrorists literally which stands for what

the Council of American Islamic Relations anyway it's it's part of the Muslim Brotherhood it's I think here is in Texas there's actually banned now because it's part of the Muslim Brotherhood and they're terrorist organization

that's correct so that group with some leftist organizations went had a hisy fit and sent all called the top head of the war college saying this guy's me islamophobe if you guys do this you're a white supremacist i'm a white supremacist it really went hysterical and they had petitions and uh i forget her name uh sarsur like a lot of the a lot of the famous big mouths were like at it and lo and behold all of a sudden two days before i was supposed to go to talk in 2019 they called me up and said oh we're going to postpone it you know

They pulled you. Yeah. They pulled you. Yeah. So I not want to take it lying down and made sure everyone knew about this. So I wrote articles about it and a lot of people picked it up. And before long, like something like 10 congressional congressman represented me and sent a letter to Trump. And the Association of Scholars, I forget it's like a well-known Association of Scholars,

American Association of Scholars also wrote a long letter and it got petitions all from colleges and professors. It became a big thing. And then before long, and people were sending me email saying, we've pulled our children out of that school. We can't believe they would cancel someone just because he's going to talk about history and they're buckling into Islamic terrorists. And, you know, the U.S. Army War College of all places, right? Not Berkeley. That's right. That's right.

I mean, that's different. So obviously they got ashamed eventually. and they reached out to me again, and I made sure not to respond to them for a couple months to keep the heat on until they were like begging me, and then I said, okay, fine. That's hilarious.

All right. And I went, and it was, they told me it was their most packed event. I think the only one more than mine was a Buzz Aldrin event. Oh, wow. And so to which I say, thank you, Care, for all the free publicity, because everyone wanted to know, what's this about, right? And the only one thing that kind of annoyed me is they, it was part of the agreement is it was being videotaped and they would put it on, on their whatever website.

And they never did. You know, why? Because when I did give the talk, it was in February of 2020. And COVID happened. And all of the sudden, that became the excuse. We can't, we can't, you know, because of COVID, we can't publish videos. And that was it. Okay.

So that's one of the, that was one of the main cancellations. But it was actually a victory. Actually, me and care, we have, we had. two big run-ins and both of them are victories for me. This one and another one was at a Seattle-based college that invited me. And all of a sudden, MSNBC, you can still find it online. It's like a big spread about Islamophobia with my face. And I'm bewildered because I didn't, because I just walked in to give a talk.

And just to show you, I just give you an idea in your audience of the little tricks they play. I went in. It's a Seattle-based college. It was packed again because there was a lot of controversy. And I remember giving the talk and I mean there were students sitting on the ground because all the chairs were taken, right? And then when you look at the spread,

I can't even show it to you on MSNBC. They show just one woman in a black burqa and another Muslim man and then like one kind of one kid. And like that represents who came. But it was packed. It was packed with regular normal Americans who were very happy to hear this.

But that's how they publicly portray. That's the image they wanted to. to give to the world. Okay. All right, well, let's get into it. So here's where I want to start, and you can start wherever you want to because I've read two of your books and you get a lot, you take this. All right.

So here's the vibe that I got growing up. Public school, mid-90s. And honestly, like, Kentucky, fairly conservative state, you know, that kind of thing. So now I'm not in like Portland. But the vibe that I always had until I read your book was this kind of vibe of like, Hey, man, yeah, you know, the Crusades were really, it was just all racist, genocidal, colonizing Christians. And kind of how it would get brought up, particularly is, you know, anytime that there was,

you know, any form of Muslim violence, you'd be like, oh, okay, yeah, there are some. But Christians can be just as violent too, because the racist, genocidal colonizing Christians did these unprovoked attacks called the Crusades, how evil. that's the vibe I always got. I'm going to set you up with a quote that I have heard you mention before from a guy named John Esposito, Georgetown University. So this is a professor, Georgetown University. This is the vibe I always got.

It's like, here's his quote. Five centuries of peaceful coexistence elapsed before political events and an imperial papal power play led to centuries-long series of so-called holy wars that pitted Christixt. against Islam and left an enduring legacy of misunderstanding and distrust from Muslims. Raymond Ibrahim, what say you? That is such a paradigmatic and excellent quote because it's really, you're really setting up the question in a perfect way because I'm now going to happily dismantle it all for you and rebuild it.

So what he just said there is five centuries of peaceful coexistence elapsed between Muslims and Christians before the Crusades, left to Mr. understanding and bitterness from Muslims. All right. So what's five centuries? He's talking about from the dawn of Islam, which is the official date. I mean, Muhammad's born in 570, but the official date is 622 to 1095. That's the first crusade. So he's, you know, he's estimating five centuries. All that time is peaceful coexistence, right? Okay. Yes, of course. So now let's see what really did happen. Okay. Once, okay, I'll give you the sort of digest version because the sword and Cimitar is the story of what happened, and it's over 300 pages.

You do whatever you want. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so Muhammad dies. Jihad is declared on all the non-Muslims around Arabia, okay? After they've been consolidated, there's these Rida wars where the, you know, some people want to apostasize. Anyway, they all become collectively the Islamic Ummah. They're localized.

They're in Arabia. They're Arabs, as Muhammad was. And at that point, and what I'm telling you now is. is the Islamic historiography. So this is what Muslim history teaches, right? And a lot of Westerners just kind of like poo-poo it and, oh, no, it's hagiographical, meaning it's made up, it's embellished. It wasn't really like that. But okay, this is what the Muslim histories say. Then they declare jihad, and they sent letters, for example, to various kingdoms saying, we're giving you three choices, the famous Islamic choices, which is convert, become one with us, become equal. If you're a

person of the book, as they're called, which is a Jew or a Christian, pay Jizia and live in tribute. Jizia is a word that is connected to the idea of like a substitution, which means I'm buying my life by paying you, okay? Because they like to translate as a poll tax, which is to me kind of euphemistic. It's all I've heard it. Yeah. It's to me more like, you know, you're being extorted or else you can get killed or be enslaved immediately. So they could have that option and maintain their religion, but also it's not

equality or anything like that. You maintain your Christian or Jewish identity, but you are openly treated as a, at best, second-class citizen. You have no rights compared to a Muslim, and you have to embrace that. Or you fight to the death. So those were the three options. Islamic historiography is full of that. Okay. Now, when we look at the world, or at least the old world, what we're talking about at this time in the 7th century, right when Islam is about to erupt out of Arabia. We're looking primarily at the Christian world because North Africa and what we today call the Middle East at that time was it was mostly known as Greater Syria, but it encompassed

all the countries that we know, modern day Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, and the Asia Minor, what we call Turkey, all of that. I just want to interject. A lot of Christians don't know what you're about to say. I know. So like I did a like a I visited all the seven churches mentioned in the book of Revelation last year. And honestly, man, I felt like an idiot. I did not realize until that trip, they're all in Turkey.

Yeah. So it's like the center of Christianity. Yeah. When the apostle John writes the book of Revelation, the center of Christianity. I really should unpack this because this isn't a important point. I'm glad you kind of like stop me there because if you go to, okay, again, you know, one with the idea that you had, which is, you know, the crusaders are evil, Christian, white, racist. The other idea is that Christianity is like this European thing.

Yeah, maybe we know Jesus comes from the Middle East and he's Jewish, but, you know, it's a European thing. All right. So in this, in fact, when the time we're talking about where Islam is being born, Christianity, the heart of it is in North Africa. It's in what we today call the Arab world. It's Egypt. Okay. It's in greater Syria. It's in Asia Minor, Turkey.

As you said, I mean, look at all the letters in the Book of Revelation. It's in Asian-Mahy. It's in North Africa of St. Augustine, this great luminary theologian. It's from Algeria. He's a Berber. The Coptic Christians, for example, one of the oldest churches, the Armenians, right? These are the oldest, the Assyrians, Aramaic speakers. So if you looked before the Islamic phenomena arose and you looked at the Christian world,

most of it was in North Africa and in the Middle. Middle East and Europe was actually the secondary part. It was the lesser part. In fact, Constantine the Great, the emperor, who became Christian, because everything was in the East, moved the capital to the east to Asia Minor, Constantinople, which today is Istanbul, of course, is in Asia minor. Because that's where everything was. All the learning, all the theology was Greek speakers and a little bit Latin later. So it's ironic when you talk about today, if you mentioned something like Egypt or Syria. It's people just assume it was kind of like always Islamic. And it wasn't. It was actually part of the Hellenistic world. They were Greek speakers. You know what I mean?

And or Latin speakers. And that was it. So when Islam came, this was a cataclysmic event. It conquered and swallowed up literally at that time two thirds of the Christian world. This is the time when that professor is saying it was peaceful coexistence. Those five centuries was nonstop conquer. annexation and atrocities that make Islamic State look like child's play. All right? What's the postage stamp? Like, I know this is not fair to ask a guy like you.

But, like, if you posted stamp overview, here's what happened in those five centuries. Like, what's the... Basically, just conquest, abduction, enslavement, harrims, you know, sex slavery. This is a Quranic principle. Muhammad engaged in it. You're probably familiar with what's happening in Britain. you know, this gang rape and a report came out about a quarter million girls that were systematically groomed, as they used to call it.

That is to say, sexually raped and exploited in really discussing ways. That sort of thing goes all the way back to Muhammad. I mean, honestly, Muhammad himself, there's a hadith. A hadith is a, you know, where it's a recorded saying of Muhammad. It's secondary to the Quran where he tries to entice his followers to go war on what we call the Byzantine Empire, the Eastern Roman Empire, Europeans. And he says, don't you want the women of yellow? That's his language?

Yeah. Well, in translation, he says the women of yellow. And linguists try to figure it out, but the best explanation is he means fair, skin, fair haired, women, Europeans. Yeah. And that's a motif that actually just repeats itself all throughout history. People don't know. The entire Viking phenomena was almost came into being because the Abbasid Caliphate wanted

white slaves. What? Yeah. Click on that real quick. I'm curious. So the Vikings, which we know, right, who would raid and plunder the European coastline, England, France, everywhere, a lot of it was to get slaves, white slaves, and sell it to the Arabs because they would pay top dollar for it.

And one of the ways we know this is when you find all these Viking treasure troves are full of abasped golden coins. What are they getting from them? It was primarily slaves. And we do know that there was a premium on European slaves, especially women. Okay. So that kind of thing goes on habitually. But before we finish the Christian aspect of the Middle East and North Africa. So this was really one century, Muhammad died, 632, 732, one century, Muslims have conquered that entire area and now are in the middle of France fighting at the Battle of Tours, Charles Martel, one century.

All right. Jeez. Look at it. So they've conquered that ancient, original, richer, more sophisticated, more developed part of Christendom violently and savagely. You were asking me all the things they did. Massacres, mass enslavement, systematic destruction of churches, turning them into mosques later on, especially the nicer ones, and the enslavement and so forth.

And then this goes into Spain. Okay. So now they're in Europe. Same thing. And in 7-11, Spain gets conquered. and then 732 now they're at tours, okay? All right. That's the first of John Esposito's five peaceful coexistence centuries.

Wow. So then like what precipitates the Crusades? Okay, so we'll get to that, but just, so the John Esposito quote is a perfect example of what I mean by, you see how the secondary history, he's a secondary historical source. Look at how he presented it in the exact opposite of reality. that, oh, everything was fine. Muslims and Christians were getting along, not that Muslims were conquering and annexing and destroying Christian territories.

Everything was fine until those crusaders dare do something, right? So not just him again. Like, that's the whole vibe I got. Yeah, yeah, it's everyone. Yeah. But that's what I mean. Like, this is why it's really a travesty when you look at these history books

that you can go and buy. And the more popular of the book, as I'm sorry to say, oftentimes the worst it is. It's like that. John Esposito was. was a really famous professor at Georgetown, and he was to the point that he was the editor-in-chief of the Oxford history of Islam. Jeez. Now, that's the mentality that is in charge of that really prestigious encyclopedia, Oxford Encyclopedia, okay?

So it's like, it's not, you know, sometimes it's not fair to ask somebody about, like, to guess motive. But, like, let me, like, this is curious to me. Like, when I'm reading your stuff, I start two years ago. I'm reading your stuff and I'm like, dude, this is, it's like I'm plugging for the Matrix. I'm like, this is literally the opposite of like everything, all the vibes that I got. And then, you know, I read more and the more I'm realizing like, oh, this is, this is legit, you know. And it's ubiquitous. It's the air you breathe, right?

That's the slant. Why do you think that is? All right. I actually don't think, I mean, your question is sort of touching on, which makes sense. and it could be, and it probably is in select cases, but that these people are intentionally lying for whatever reason. They're getting paid, right? I think, of course, there is some truth to that,

but what really happens is the lie gets created and it just snowballs, and everyone goes with a lie because they accept it as the truth. Okay, so what I did is most historians or would-be historians, they get all their knowledge from the secondary histories. So they'll go and get, you know, oh, there's a topic I want to read about or study. they'll get maybe 10 books of John Espizito and Karen Armstrong and all the well-known names

who have PhDs and come from the Ivy League and they've published best-selling books about whatever, something Islamic. They'll read those books and then that's all they'll know. So they don't know they're lying and their colleagues read the same books. So it becomes like a little ecosystem. We all agree to it

until someone like me comes and says, well, let me see what the original guys had to say. The guys are word there and you find out, they're saying something way different. They're not saying what. And the Muslims validate them. So even, you know, the Muslims and the Christians are enemies at this time. But they both, their records validate what they're, you know, they're in agreement about what's happening. So you don't even, like you would say, man, I'm not even sure there is a motive.

You're like, no, there's not, maybe not a motive. No, no, I believe there. I actually, I mean, I'm a firm believer, there is emotives and there are, you know, guiding intelligences behind lots of what we're discussing. I'm just saying they're usually, you know, at the very top. And then it just trickle, then it becomes, it snowballs and takes a life of its own and everyone just agrees to it.

And this isn't just what we're talking about. We're talking about books, but I think everything like in the news, you know, the things that we talk about how the left thinks, okay, I have no doubt that the left

is an engineered construct because it's insane. But most of the people who think that way are, they believe it. You know, they're, they're sheep. Okay,

but I do believe behind them are people exploiting them and putting these thoughts into their heads. So do you, like, I mean, do you mind me what you think, even so the people who create the lies? What do you, what's your best guess on motive on that? Why does it? Control, you know, control. For example, when I see, you know, in the West, this, okay, there's this, you know, like, relentless assault on boys and girls, but to convince them you're not a boy, you're really a girl, right?

A complete emasculation. Let's just talk about boys for now, but same thing with girls. Okay, you're just taught, you know, you don't know, that's toxic masculinity. And parents are taught, oh, I want to make sure my son has the opportunity. If he wants to play with a doll or, you know, wear a pink dress. Okay, that thing, to me, this is not organic. This is you want to control society.

The first thing you want to do is emasculate the men. Who would you write, if you want to control a group, who do you think would be harder to control 10 guys that think they're women or 10 of you and me. Yeah, probably you and me. Yeah, right? Okay, so I do believe, like, that is why we see all this sexual confusion and all this, you know, literally emasculation. Because it's such an easy way to control people.

If my day is busy thinking about, you know, what pronoun I'm going to be identified by, yeah, I'm a fool and you can control me and manipulate me any way you want, right? So that's why I mean, I do believe there's motives. I do believe a lot of it is engineered. and I do believe a lot of it is ultimately for control. And you as a pastor, I think you will appreciate this. I do believe it's ultimately diabolical and part of the cosmic war between good and evil. I do think that. I do think that.

Okay, let me, I want to show you something and just see, like, I want you to react to something. Because what I've noticed is like a lot of these vibes that just, it seems like, you know, so my theory on some of this is that the strategy is sometimes rewrite the past to control the future. Of course. Absolutely. Rewrite the past. So if we rewrite the past as, man, honestly, it's the, especially the, you know, we'd have to do the whole thing.

But, man, if we rewrite the past as the Christians are the bad guys, then they, man, look what happened when they had control. Right. always, always, always about demonizing Christians and making modern day their descendants, Europeans, modern day Americans and so forth, disavow their heritage, not want to be like those people because they were horrible. And so if you're not going to be like them, and what were they? Well, they were normal, religious, and commonsensical, and conservative. So you have to be the opposite. Otherwise, you'll be like these evil, horrible Christians. So that is absolutely

the case. You can see this. I call it fake history, which I find much more dangerous than fake news, for the reasons that you alluded to because fake history, okay, fake news, right? There's a new headline and it's a lie and it creates its chaos and whatever, but it's ephemeral. It goes on and the new cycle has something tomorrow. Fake history creates overarching narratives that you see reality through. So I'll give you a perfect. So one example, of course, is what we're talking about.

Oh, the Christians are the bad guys and poor Muslims. Now you need to make it up for them. Bring them into your country and shut up and, you know, that kind of mentality. But here's another one. the idea that slavery is a white man thing, right? White men created it. Everyone else, I don't know if you've ever seen this. I talked about her a lot.

There's this a black professor. Her name is Bridget Cooper at Rugger's University. You need to watch this clip. She comes up and she talks about literally she says whites are the ones who did slavery. Before that, yellow, black and brown people got along. And there's just something inherently evil about white people. And we got to take those mofos out. This is a professor.

Okay. Now, yeah, yeah. But you know what? But it makes sense that she says that because she's been taught that, yeah, slavery is something that white man created. Okay. In reality, of course, and if you want to talk about Islam, they've enslaved way more people historically. Really? Oh, my God. Yeah. And really, really, and the slavery was always accompanied with sadism and real mistreatment because those they enslave are infidels. And there's a whole, you know, teachings about how to treat the infidel. And I'll give you one example. They enslaved a ton of blacks from sub-Saharan Africa. You know what they did too? At the same time, they castrated all the males because they didn't want their blood polluting their genes. Wow. So that's why in the Arab world, you don't have black DNA.

Wow. Look at it in America. You still have a large black population because that didn't happen to them. Okay. Wow. There's also the fact that, well, who actually abolished slavery? Okay, whites and Americans did it, but so did everyone else. But who abolished it?

Oh, it was Europeans. It was whites. Saudi Arabia had slavery officially up until the 1970s. Wow. Yeah. And the Islamic world, the only reason it was officially canceled was due to the colonial powers, which now we're told they're the bad guys. Oh, the colonial era.

Colonizers. Imperial colonizers. Yeah. They actually got, you know, did away with slavery. So this is why history is so weaponized. If you don't know all this and what you're told and this is what we're told, that whites, Europeans, Christians historically were just monsters. Yeah, there's a reason for that fake history and that narrative

because now you, to be a good person, have to do the opposite. You have to be tolerant. You have to be a doormat to everyone else, Muslims especially. You have to make up for your sins and all that sort of thing. So it's very effective. It's very diabolical, you know, and it's so widespread and permeates everything. Now, we're talking about books and Esposito. Look at Hollywood.

Yeah, I mean, you know, you're telling me about this idea of the, of the Crusaders are, you know, these evil, racist, whatever. That's in every movie. And there's no movie that you can watch where they don't come out like that. And the Muslims are the noble magnanimous, you know, sort of wise characters like Saladin. It's always like that. Actually, it's actually dovetails something I want to ask you. Like what? So two primary objections, then I want you to respond to something that was very, very viral.

This is a good example. talking about here in a second. Two objections that I think people would have, like when they hear what you're talking about. Number one is, hey, Raymond, aren't you selectively editing history? Because, man, there have been times even in antiquity when Christians and Muslims and Jews live together in prosperous ways. What about Andalusia? You know, things like that. Like, I think some people would say, man, you're selectively editing. My response to that is when we talk about the long war that I documented in the years. books, okay, it initiates from the Muslim world and it continues on everywhere always until

it's stopped. Okay? That's the history. So there was never a time where you had a Muslim power living side by side with a non-Muslim power and it just said, oh, we'll leave you in peace. Okay. The only time that happens is when the Muslims are in the weekend. They're weakens and they can't do much about it, which is kind of like now. So, okay, and to Lucia, all one has to do is look at a book by a friend of mine, Dario. Fernandez Morera, professor, is called the Andalusian myth. It's about a 600-page book. And he just goes into it deeply and just shows you how it was another fake history fabricated a few decades ago. Okay. And if you want to talk about cherry-picking, that's the cherry-picking.

Here's what these golden age myths, what they are like. They look at a place like Andalusia, which is the Islamic name for Spain, conquered Spain. And they see things like wealth. They see great architecture, okay? They see opulent palaces and, you know, waterfalls. And they learn and they see, oh, there was a lot of, you know, literary works being produced in Arabic and whatnot. So it seems like, wow, this is a, you know, very kind of like, um, advanced time. And it seems like it. And then they compare it to Europe and they say, oh, this is the dark ages and these people are living like, you know, just backwards, et cetera. Okay. Now, I'll give you a proper analogy with the truth. Are you familiar with a, what is it, UAE?

They have these like... United Arab Emirates. Yeah, whichever one of those has those massive skyscrapers and they're like... Dubai? Dubai, I think, maybe, yeah. Where they have like all this crazy architecture. Really impressive architecture. Okay, imagine now 100, 200 years from now and the world's changed and that civilization's gone.

Western civilization is gone. But people come and they see those, wow, those skyscrapers and there's nothing like it. And then they start learning, oh, and there was a lot of. of wealth here and this and that and oh there were workers from the philippines and no maybe this was a really advanced kind of society all right but the truth it was but why well one it was it was oil money so none of that was actually built by them it was built by western engineers for example and two they were living still like under sharia islamic primitive law in andalusia well yeah in andalusia okay so i was giving you the example of uh like uae or saudi arabia

But, okay, so yeah, in Endelicia, I'll give you a perfect example. At the height of the Golden Age, something, there's what's known as the martyrs of Cordoba. And Cordoba is the jewel of Endelucia. This is the Golden Age. And right at that time, basically, you had something like 50, 60 Christians, Spaniards, who were systematically executed because they were declaring Jesus Christ. Some of them had converted or their parents had converted out of duress to Islam, like most Spaniards did, during the conquests, and they wanted to sort of unburdened their soul and say, no, I'm going back

to Christianity. I renounce your prophet. And they were skinned alive, beheaded, boiled alive, crucified, torn to pieces. In this Andalusia. In the golden age of Andalusia. Yeah, because that's the one that people typically point to as a historical example of like peace and harmony. See that. So what I'm saying is, no, no, there was, what it had is, it had wealth because it was plundering it from Europe. And Cordoba, again, This is the heart of the golden age, the Endlsean myth, was the slave emporium of the Muslim world. So why? Because it was based in Europe, and I told you they wanted European slaves.

So that was where all the European slaves that they could hunt down from Europe were brought to Cordoba and sold there. So my point is, yeah, it was opulent, it was rich, it was advanced, had good architecture, and it had literature. That doesn't mean that what we associate with radical Islam and tribal primitiveness wasn't there. it still was, you know. So what about like, okay, before we react to this thing from this, it's a Tucker clip, I want you to react to. So, all right, you just mentioned radicalism. I think that's something, and this is honestly, I don't know what to think about it.

So I'm just, I'm just, that's why I'm most excited about this. I'm just genuinely asking. So I think what some people would say, or like this is the vibe that I've picked up before is, man, you're selectively choosing the actions of a few to tarnish the reputation of the vast majority. And I will say, you know, you walk around Dallas. There's a lot of like, you know, I call them Sweetie Pie Muslims. You know, they just seem like sweet little families, drive my Uber, you know, whatever it is.

And then I pulled, you know, you've got some, you've got quotes from, to tie into this. Some people would hear that and they go, and Raymond, doesn't the Quran command, command peace and acceptance and nonviolence? And they'll quote things, I'll just give a couple quotes. Indeed, the believers, Jews, Christians, and Sabians, whoever truly believes in Allah and the last day and does good will have their reward with the Lord, and there will be no fear for them, nor will they grieve. Or like, here's another quote. Let there be no compulsion in religion. So I think what they would say is, hey, man, you know, these people who did this stuff you're talking about, they were actually disobeying. Like, that's what they would say.

For the truth stands out clearly from falsehood. So whoever renounces false gods and believes in Allah has certainly grasped the firmest, unfailing handhold, and a lot of, Allah is all hearing and all knowing. So Raymond Ibrahim, aren't you just using the actions of a few to tarnish the reputations of a majority and your selective editing? All right. Very good. So let's dig into this. All right. The first thing is, and I'm always confronted by that question, which is, which I can also word in a different way, which is, I know a good Muslim, you know, my cab driver or my, the guy at 7-Eleven, you know, he's a great guy. Okay, fine. I have no problem with that, and that does not in any way, shape, or form pose any problem for me, because I am not interested in what a human, how they practice their religion. I already know amongst Christianity and all religions, you can, it is a teaching. And then you can, you can call yourself a Christian and do the exact opposite, right? So I'm not, that doesn't do anything for me. I'm sure there are Muslims out there who are great, awesome people, right? What I care about is.

is what does the religion teach. Yes. That's it. Yeah. And guess what? That is easily ascertained. We can find that out. This is not a mystery at all.

Unlike Christianity, actually, one good thing about Islam is it's very black and white. It's very simple. It doesn't have a metaphysical side or, you know, something about my relationship with God or something abstract. It's just the law. Literally, it's the law. The word is submit. Islam means submit. Well, what am I submitting to?

To the laws of Allah, which we call Sharia. Okay? So we know what those laws are. And some of them, I can just tell you, okay, if you're an apostate, if you want to leave, you're born it. Muslims are born into it. If your father is a Muslim, you're a Muslim. There's no baptism or ceremony. That's it.

You're born into it. And if you try to leave, yeah, you can die. That's part of Islam. That Muhammad said in a canonical hadith, whoever leaves his religion, Islam, kill him. And now you have basically in the Sunni Islam, you have four schools of jurisprudence. all of them agree that the apostate has to be punished. Most of them say kill him. Some say don't kill the woman, just keep her trapped in a house and starve her.

Yeah, all sorts of things like that. Blasphemers, anyone who dares speak against Allah and his prophet. Same thing, okay? This is part of the religion. This is not in any way, shape, or form a radical interpretation. Does this still happen in nations today? Oh, yeah, all the time. I was telling about those reports.

I write Muslim persecution every month. There's people who are killed because they're perceived in seen as apostates who became Christians or who are being jailed, killed because they spoke something or perceived or accused of speaking against Islam. Okay. Sex slavery, concubinage. Yeah, that's in the Quran. I told you, Muhammad did it.

It's part of the religion. Slavery was only abolished because Western forces forced Islam to abolish it. But it's part of the, and it still goes on underground. There's 50 million slaves around the world, almost all of them in Africa and Asia and the Middle East. Okay. So the religion is the religion, and it is what we're talking about. Then there's the history, which, so we're talking about the doctrines, some of the more problematic ones.

The history is one long manifestation of the doctrines. So even history validates that, yeah, it's not just some abstract book or a verse. This is what happened. This is what they did. Okay. As far as the issue about, you know, there's some verses in the Quran, you have your religion, I have mine, the Sabians, et cetera, et cetera. what people don't understand is that Islam, there's a whole science in Arabic. It's called Al Nesich with Mansook.

And what this in translation means is the abrogated and the abrogator, which basically means Muslims realize real quick, if you look the Quran and you want to make sense of it and you want to create laws out of it, it contradicts itself. Because there is verses that sound peaceful and say there's no compulsion and you have your religion, et cetera, et cetera. But then there's verses that say, fight the infidel, you know, conquer them, kill, them, subjugate them. And so the logic of what this doctrine, which is widespread, and the only

way you can understand the Quran, is the revelations, as they're called, that came to Muhammad earlier, get abrogated, get canceled, replaced by the later ones. Okay. Okay. And it just so happens that if you look at Muhammad's career, it's sort of split into the earliest phases in Mecca and the later phases in Medina. In Mecca, he was weak, he was outnumbered, he had no followers. That's when you get all the peaceful, tolerant verses. He goes to Medina, essentially becomes a warlord, and that's when he begins the jihad, and after about a decade, he's almost conquered most of Arabia, reconquered Mecca around 630. That's when he gets the verses that now go on the offensive. And the two verses that are amongst the very latest, they're from Sudut al-Tobah,

which we know as chapter 9 in the Quran, is 9-5 and 9-29, and they are collectively known as the sword verses. Because these verses, 929, for example, says, Fight the People of the Book, Christians and Jews, until they paid tribute, Jizia, and feel themselves subdued. And 9-5 says, you know, wherever you find the pagans, slay them, lay an ambush for them, lay an ambush for them, await them, slay them, and kill them. Those two verses, according to the olamah, as they're known, the scholars,

and there's consensus on this, and consensus is very important in normative Islam, abrogate all that peaceful stuff. Okay. That's one main view. The second view is similar and more elastic. What it says is you, the Muslim, can implement the verses that you find yourself in a situation.

So if I find myself, I'm a Muslim and I'm living in an infidel country and I'm outnumbered, yeah, I'm going to quote what Muhammad quoted when he was weak, the Meccan verses, the tolerant verses, as a ruse.

And when the time comes that now I'm in a stronger position, that's when I implement the violence later verses. Jeez. And you do see this. Is that historically what kind of happens? Yes.

Yeah. You know, when ISIS came to power in 2014, 2013, 2013, I remember because I do follow, if you're going to do that, I'm going to start eating too. All right. Go ahead. I'm enjoying this. I will. Around with the rise of ISIS, because I follow the persecution of Christians, I came across

a lot of stories of Assyrians and other Christians living in Syria and in Iraq. and they talked about how they lived, you know, their people, the Christians lived with Muslims side by side in villages for, you know, decades, centuries, and they knew each other. And they would, oftentimes, a lot of the Christians were better off and they would help the Muslims and whatnot. And they talked about them as family. And then when ISIS came to town, those same Muslims went and pointed out and said, that's the Christian house. This is where we get, if you remember, the noon, the N, that, you know, it was like a, you know, it's like a symbol. It's the Arabic letter for Nasara, which ISIS and those Muslims would put on Christian homes to say this is where the Christian lives. And people started using it as a sign of solidarity.

But there were numerous accounts like that. And the people, the Christians said they were just like, they were so shocked. I thought this guy was like family. And the moment the circumstance changed and Islam came to town, they just jumped on that bandwagon. I didn't plan to go here. Trinity. Can you grab, can you pull that? there's a graphic that does the three phases of Muslim immigration.

So this went like viral a few years ago. I want to know this is why I like doing stuff like this, because I can ask you if this is true or not. So like this went crazy viral like a year ago, and I grabbed it. It's three phases of Muslim immigration. Phase one, few in number, oppressed Islam, play the victim, claim Islamophobia,

more tolerant of others. Phase two, large minority, indignant Islam, threatening, demand Sharia law, intolerant, infidels. Phase three, clear majority, dominant Islam, militant, strict Sharia law, kill subdual, infidels. And then it says for 1,400 years, this pattern hasn't changed, et cetera, moderately, is that true? Logically, it's true.

Historically, I'll say it's not true for one reason, because you can only get away with this amongst stupid Westerners. Okay? And historically, Westerners aren't stupid. Okay, so phase one, play the victim, claim Islamophobia, wouldn't have worked a few centuries ago, you can't go to a European country in the middle of evil era and be, oh, I'm going to press Muslim. They'd kick you out.

That isn't working like Anglo-Saxon, Britain, probably. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so, so yeah, it works now, but historically, to their credit, Europeans would not have fallen because it requires naivity. You have to, for phase one, you have to be naive and go, oh, they're poor victims, oh, Islamophobia, oh, I got to give you tolerance. That wouldn't have happened, okay? So, but, but now, yes, this is absolutely.

correct amongst the naive west. So like for listeners, because like if you're like me and you're trying to get your head around historically has this work in civilizations, you know, it's like, honestly, if you just zoom out, like as I'm reading your stuff, I'm like, if I just zoom out, once upon a time, there were zero Muslim nations, and now there's 50. Well, that happens somehow. Yeah. No, but what, so what do you do with like nations?

Like, I think it's like Albania. There's like a few nations where it's like people got, hey, man, see, that's a, that's a Muslim nation where it's very tolerant and pluralistic. and how do you think about that? Well, okay, the truth is, is Albania. For historic, Albania is really like schizophrenic because what's funny about it is it became Muslim through coercion. One of the guys, I don't know what that is.

Do you remember Skanderbeg? I don't. Okay, one of the characters and Defenders of the West, Chapter 7, I think, is this Albanian hero. He's probably one of the greatest warriors of Christendom who fought the Ottomans, kept them out of Albania for a quarter of a century. I do remember this guy, yep. Yeah.

Anyway, after him, the Muslims were so indignant that they, once they did conquer Albania, Albania is basically either, there was no, you pay tribute, you become Muslim or not. So that's why it entered into Albania. But what's funny about it is that it's so, it's just a nominal thing, it's just a superficial thing, because their hero and their flag is still Scanderbeg who fought Islam, the Muslims. The Muslims of Albania still venerate the Christian guy who fought Islam. Okay. I don't know. Why? Yeah. Because he's their hero. But at the same time, they're all very secular and atheistic. If you go to Albania, it's like nobody there is, it's just a nominal thing. Yeah, it's like we're called Muslims, but there's literally almost nobody there who's a true Muslim. I'm sure there are. It's almost like an example. I grew up in the Bible Bell South. And a lot of times you would see people like, yeah, dude, you know, they're taking a census and like, well, you know, I'm not a Muslim and I'm not an atheist. So yeah, I guess I'm a Christian. Is it kind of that kind of vibe?

Yeah. We would call it cultural Christian. And they're like, I'm culturally mussel. Yeah, it's my cultural thing. Yeah. Oh, there's this thing, Ramadan. We hang out on night to eat, you know, we feast. And, you know, for that, for that particular, I mean by Albania.

You know, it's such an aberration. It has a weird history. It's still very European in a way. It, it's flag is the guy who fought Islam, even though they're Muslims. It's like really a weird kind of dynamic, which I would say is very aberrant and doesn't really reflect on our topic because we have multiple examples that validate what we're talking about, you know. And so you'll always find an aberration.

And even in Albania, I don't want to make it sound like there. I'm sure there's a radical Muslim there here or two, you know, I'm sure. But I say by and large, they're very kind of like a secular atheistic. It's the same thing with the Stan countries, you know, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, they are Islamic, but because of under Soviet rule, they're literally atheistic. So, you know, they're not, you know what I mean? Okay. So it's just, yeah, it's like a nominal, name cultural thing.

But you're saying like when, when, you're saying in general, historically and geopolitically, when actual practicing Muslims gain power, that graphic tends to happen. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So that's what we're seeing in Europe right now. I want to ask you about that. And America, too, which is when they're tiny minorities, oh, you know, I'm oppressed. I need special privileges because I'm being,

oppressed, and then when they become stronger but still a minority, then they become more demanding and more assertive. Yeah, you're seeing that everywhere in Europe. And then, of course, I'll give you another perfect example of what happened. So, in Nigeria, that's one of the rare countries where the Muslims and Christians are literally

50-50. It's a genocide of Muslims against Christians now, because 50-50, well, the Muslims... Does it ever happen the other way where the Christians attack the Muslims on that kind of thing? You mean Nigeria or in general? In Nigeria? No, no, not at all. The guy just didn't know.

I wanted to ask. No, no, no, no, it's a good question. No, no. It's, it is, okay, and here's how the media plays it. The media will never tell you it's Muslims or Christians. It'll say there's, it's, it's, it's. Dude, I've noticed this. Yeah.

I've, keep going. I've noticed this. They'll say, okay, they'll say, oh, these herdsmen because they need grazing land, invaded and attacked and, you know, killed a sedentry village. And that's it. And they tie it to climate change. Have you noticed this? Yeah.

Openly they tie it to climate change. But then you find out, oh, all the herdsmen are Muslim, and they were dressed in black, chanting Islamic slogans and saying, Allah, Akbar. And all the seven tree villagers were Christians. Okay. So, yeah, it's the same dynamic over and over, but the media dissembles as usual. Now, let me, okay. Because remember, a Christian can never be the victim. Christians are the oppressors.

We worked very hard to create a fake history to convince us. you Christians are bad. So we can't have you thinking Christians are being persecuted by Muslims. That's why that topic as, as massive as it is, I mean, I told you every month I write a long report, I wish I didn't have to. It gets, nobody knows about it. Nobody, including Christians in the West, because it's such an Achilles heel. You're not supposed to believe that Christians, who we told you are the bad guys. You've got to be liberal. You know, you can't be like any Christian. or they're the ones who are being killed, and worse, by Muslims,

because we taught you, you're the bad guy, you need to accommodate the Muslims and so forth. Okay, so you mentioned, I mean, you brought, and honestly, this is one of the, you can have somebody if you want. You brought this up, like, hey, man, some of this is happening in Europe and America. So this is honestly one of the reasons

I want to reach out to you. Just to shoot you real straight. So, like, here in Dallas, like, we've got a couple areas of Dallas that are very, you know, very heavy Muslim immigration that kind of thing. So this is going to take me a second. I'm going to run through some things that are really not as much for you. They're for people who are listening. I'm chewing. Yeah, you're good.

So that we can give you a chance to eat your cookie. So that people understand, like, why is Josh asking this question. Well, this is what I'm getting ready to do, this is why I'm asking this question. Now, for listeners, what I'm doing for Christians is I just want to remind you something like biblically and theologically, what you got in the scriptures is that God establishes three institutions for the flourishing of humanity. He establishes the family, the church, and the state. Christians are not good at doing, this is not going to be a surprise to Raymond, what Christians are not good at doing is thinking in categories. So what Christians have to learn to do is with any issue, honestly, especially things like Islam, Muslim immigration, that sort of thing. Christians

have to learn how to put their theological thinking cap on, open their Bible, and then think in categories, and ask three questions, not one. Instead of just asking, man, how should I think or feel about Muslims and Muslim immigration? We actually have to ask three questions. Again, family church state. So you need to ask a question one. For me as an individual Christian leading a Christian family, how am I supposed to relate to my Muslim neighbors? Dude, we got commands for that. I'm supposed to love my neighbor. I'm supposed to share the gospel of my neighbor. Question number two. Then we need to ask the question. Awesome, man. I'm a pastor of a church with a massive missions budget. This is just, you don't know anything

about me, but that's what we, and like our goal is to fulfill the great commission, is to share Christ with all nations, teaching them to obey all the things, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Spirit. So then we ask the question, what should we do as churches? Well, we're supposed to fulfill the Great Commission. So I'm like, dude, I love, Jesus loves everybody in the world. I love everybody in the world. We're going to try to share the gospel with everybody. But then what Christians historically are not good at doing, which you are good at helping people think about, is asking the third question. What about the role of the state and thinking civilizationally? Christians, honestly, we haven't had to

to think like that for a couple hundred years. And what I'm trying to do here is, and this is leading into a long question here, is man, when Christians put their theological thinking cap on and ask the third question, how should Christians want the role of the state, the biblical role of the state thinking civilizationally to relate to things like Muslims in immigration, that's where Christians, I think, get a little naive, to put it mildly. Now, if you're listening and all this is leading into a question I'm going to ask you. So for people who are watching and you're like, dude, why is he even talking about this? So there's obviously, this is a massive conversation in Europe, parts of America. If you're not a listener from Dallas, this is a pretty big conversation in parts of

Dallas, parts of Michigan, New York City. So go ahead and toss that first thing up. Yeah, that's it. This is BBC. Muhammad overtakes Noah as the most popular boys name in England and Wales. So for listeners, I just zoom out in England and Wales. Pause for dramatic effects. It's not just there, by the way. I'm going to keep going. overtakes Noah as the, no, no, don't do that yet. So I've got some other things.

11% – you can take that down, Trini. 11% of England's mayors are now Muslim, 11% in the following cities in Europe. This is kind of thing that, like, if you're a Christian, you're like, what? What is going on? In the following cities in Europe, if you take, there's a variance of how people spell Muhammad. I think there's five primary. If you take them all and combine them into one name, in the following cities in Europe, Muhammad is now the number one male baby name.

So you have the entire nations of England and Wales, London, England, Manchester, UK, Berlin, Germany, Oslo, Norway, Brussels, Belgium, Amsterdam, Netherlands, Edinburgh, Scotland, Glasgow, Scotland, nationally as of this year for the first time in human history, nationally in Scotland, the variants of Muhammad combined are now nationally the number one baby name in all of Scotland. Before I toss up this next graphic, for people who don't know this, like I'm not as much of a history nerd as Raymond, but I'm a little bit of a history nerd. Since 1521, the King of England has been referred to, the Pope originally titled the King of England, starting in 1521, the protector of the faith, or the defender of the faith, talking about the Christian faith.

Who did that? Do you know who did that? Which Pope? Yeah. Or what King? Do you know what King was originally called that? Actually, I believe it was Henry VIII. That's right.

When he was still Catholic. Okay, there you go. That's awesome. That's hilarious. Okay. But then he kept it when he became Protestant. All right. Ever since, good job.

Good job. So ever since 1521. So for 500 years, the King of England, oh, by the way, until this month has been referred to as the defender of the faith, go ahead and toss that up. As of this month for the first time in English history in 500 years, they switched it from defender of the faith because it was Christianity to defender of the faiths. And now it's like, now we're protecting all faiths. go ahead and toss that the video of the March. So this, just for people

who don't know what's going on, that's a March, and you may look at that and you may be gone, this is last month, by the way. You may look at that and you may be going, oh man, I wonder what's going on

over there in Saudi Arabia. Yeah, exactly. That's Michigan. That's Michigan. By the way, I don't know, what are those flags. Do you know what those flags are? I'm going to see what's written on them.

Yeah. I mean, it's all, I mean, based on the context, it's all supremacist, Islamic, Arabic, jargon. Okay, I don't know. I'd try to put you on the spot there. A lot of them is the Shiheda. There's no God but Allah, Muhammad is his messenger. Okay, that kind of stuff. All right, you can take that down. So that, again, that's not like Iran. That's not Saudi Arabia.

That's Michigan. Go ahead and toss that Apple Maps thing up, Trinity. So here's what this is, Raymond. This is, because of the immigration thing, this is mosques, new mosques in the last three years just in the Dallas Metroplex. So I'm going to let that just sink in for people. These are new ones. From what I understand, new ones just in the last three years in the Dallas Metroplex.

And then I'm going to play, and I know it may be a little incendiary, but like I just want you to comment all this stuff. I'm going to tell you what I'm going to ask you. And then I'm going to tell you what I'm going to ask you, then I'm going to show this, and then I want you to answer the question. Like when people zoom out historically

and watch this trend, if the trend can, My question to you is like based on history, what's next? So before you asked that question, this next thing you're getting ready to see is this is an imam in, if I remember right, I think it's in New York. This is an imam in New York. And he's explaining to people the strategy. Go ahead and play this real quick, Trini. One day you're going to be the president of the United States of America.

No one, go in Michael Ali, who can stop you from becoming a president. Dream big. Have a vision. because if Barack Hussein Obama can be a president, Soheb Jowad cannot be a president? Do Muslims think of him as a Muslim president? He's going to be a president. His father was Muslim, right?

The Muslims would take over Makkah. They used to laugh at him. Now listen real close. What happened? What is Makkah now? It's coming. Change is coming to America. And what is Allah telling us,

Kuntum Khaira ummatin. You are the best of nations. You're better than everybody else. That's what Allah is saying. Let's work towards that. Let's work towards a Muslim mayor. Next election that comes in, nominate people for the school board of education. Next election that comes here, nominate people for the local township.

Begin the demographic change. People converted. There's a big, huge conversion going on in this time. Where are the converts? They just convert and they're gone in the wilderness. The other thing, children. Muslims have the highest population. This is a big right.

Pugh Foundation did a research study, Pew Foundation. and they said that Muslim household average is 3.4 child per family. The white American has one child per family. We're already beating the march because these are voters. These are not just babies being born in hospital. These are voters. That's the way a politician looks at it. We have to change the framework.

We start looking at things from a different lens, different angle for future. You're not going to change society today in your lifetime, but you think about your grandchildren. There you go. So, right, when you see that, first of all, is that fringe rhetoric or is that historically centered? When you see all that, like, as you're watching what's happening in the world, Europe, parts of America, what do you think about it? And then, like, historically, like, if the trend continues, you know, what happens?

So first of all, what you just played, I've seen countless of that throughout the years because I know Arabic and I can, I just watch them. I mean, you're lucky when you get a translation or if he speaks in English. but they are constantly, they feel especially relaxed speaking Arabic because most people don't know what they're saying. So that sort of message is like I can anytime go on the satellite and hear some guy saying something like that. First of all, so that's very common, very mainstream. And second, you have to understand, let's go back to the concept of jihad, right? And I find it very interesting. Here's one of those ironies.

Maybe you're acquainted with what I'm going to say. But one of the apologia's about the word jihad is historically it was translated as holy. War, right? Because that's what it was. It manifested itself the way I described it in Holy War, war on behalf of empowering Islam. And Muslims and scholars will tell you no, that's not what the word means. It actually means to strive, to struggle. Okay. And guess what? Yes, that is literally the word, what it means. The connotation, of course, is Holy War, because that's how historically, if you were going to empower Islam vis-à-vis the infidel, if you were going to beat the infidel, you have to do it through war because they're not going to let you walk in and take over them.

This is why when you ask me to explain it historically, it's not that easy because what we're seeing today doesn't have a historical precedent. Oh, really? No. The historical precedent is Islam was aggressive and it tried to conquer. What we have today is Western countries empowering and taking in Muslims and allowing to come in and being outbred by them and appeasing them. Europeans never did that before.

That's never happened before. Of course not. Yeah. because they actually had a civilization they wanted to defend and a faith and a religion. Today's Western person, you know, he's just, I don't know, hedonist, the nihilist, a relativist, anything's fine, right? Yeah, why not? So that's one of the issues, which we'll get to.

But the word jihad, so it's interesting because when they tell you, oh, it just means to struggle and strive, that really explains what you just saw. It does mean that, but again, what are you struggling and what are you striving to do, to empower Islam, okay? And guess what? So amongst these types and amongst the scholars and the Muslims, there's different forms of jihad. There's a physical one we know, Holy War. But there's things that they call jihad of, I'll give you the English translation, the jihad of the tongue, jihad of the pen.

Can you do the Arabic? Yeah. Jihad al-Lisain. Jihad al-Kolam. Okay. These are the jihad of the tongue, jihad of the pen. And these are basically like propaganda and disseminating lies to help Islam, to empower Islam, to cry. Islamophobia, for example, to say you are oppressing me. That's a jihad. Now, what you're seeing

is there's also what's known as different names, but jihad of the womb, which is basically breeding them, outbreeding them. So what he said, I've heard countless Muslims say this. That is the game plan. All right, we will outbreed you. By numbers, we will take over. And this is why some of these European countries like England and France, they talk about we're going to stop migration. Well, It's too little too late because you think so, for real? It's too little too late because what are you going to do with the 10% Muslim population there that's constantly outbreeding you, right? And by the way, there's a reason that Muhammad is the number one name, not Ahmed or Mustafa.

Muhammad's a popular name amongst Muslims, but in the Islamic world, if you go to a Muslim country, it's going to be in the top, but it's not necessarily going to be the number one. The reason it's the number one name is they're letting you know what this is about because that's the name of their prophets. It's a religious thing, okay? So it's like in your face. We are here to outbreed you with our prophet, you know, our master Muhammad.

So this is definitely, it has, it, now when I say, when I try to tell you that there's no historical precedent, what I mean by that is, historically, the only jihad that would work against non-Muslims, including Christians and Europeans, was the physical kind. You couldn't dupe them by saying, hey, we're going to go live in your country and we're going to start outbreeding you and you're going to give us free money and you're going to let us build mosques and you're going to suppress your faith because it's offensive for us.

That would have never happened. That's a modern day phenomenon. Okay. And that's completely a byproduct of the West's spiritual sabotage. It has nothing left. It's a vacuous civilization, unfortunately. That's why those guys and the defenders of the West were actually during these times that we're talking about the Crusades and around that, time, Europe was the weak one. That was the weak side. The strong side was the mammoth, behemoth, Ottoman sultanates and the caliphates. But they still fought tooth and nail to the death. They had something to defend. They had the faith. They had their culture. They had their families. Today, because a lot of Western people don't have any of those. They're capitulating. And they go by feel-good mantras and, oh, yes, tolerance and this and that. And, you know, one last thing is the King, and we're talking about he's defender of the faith, to defender of the faiths.

Just to show you how ludicrous it's reached. On the surface, this doesn't look bad. Okay, so, you know, of course, England is a multi-faith country, so he has to represent them all or something like that. But for starters, England or Britain has religious freedom. So you can be a Muslim, you can be a Sikh, whatever, okay? So it doesn't need that. Defender of the faith historically meant that there's a faith.

that we believe collectively, us Brits, us English, is true, which was Christianity. And we will defend this, okay? When you turn that singular faith into faiths, okay, what you've just done is said that your faith is not real, because there can only be one real faith. That's right. Faith means none of them are real. Okay, it's just an opinion that we each, he has that opinion, you have that opinion. That's a fact right there.

Yeah, but you've just, so just putting that little S, has just turned the king of England. And here, the irony is just never end. His entire monarchy is validated and justified by Christianity. He is the Christian king. And he is now going to defend a religion that in its core doctrines attack Christianity by saying things like, you know, there is no such thing as a Trinity. Christ is not the son of God.

Only filthy infidels will say that. We have to fight and kill them. So he's now going to protect that mentality. and yet he's the defender of the faith. So, like, I read this quote years ago, and I made sure it was legit. So Erdogan, the guy, the Turkey, the president of Turkey, president, is that what he's called? President? Okay.

He said this, because he was originally democratically elected. And now that's not how it rolls over there. So his quote was, democracy is like a street car. You ride it until you get where you want to go and then you get off. Yeah? That's absolutely the Islamic game plan. You just saw him. They constantly come and the Muslims will tell you,

oh, we're going to vote for the Muslim candidate, right? Okay, well, that's not democracy. That's tribalism. That's like a white guy saying, we're voting for the white guy. How does that look, right? You're supposed to vote for the guy that represents what's best for the society, right?

That sort of thing. But they come collectively. They don't even know who it is. It's just the Muslims because that's all we care about. We are a tribe. We're not here to assimilate. We're not here to have a civic society with you. That's beneficial to you and me.

It's just Islam 101. But it's found a little groove and it's exploiting it due to the naivety that's embedded. And the problem with Western civilization and society as it is today is it such a, it takes it for granted. It's very high trust society. And then you bring a sort of parasitic element that is not like that at all, that sees you as the enemy and just sees you as a freebie. what can I exploit this person out of? I'm not here to, you know, get along with. Like, you know, we saw all these, you know, financial scams, the Somalis, you know,

what was it? Minnesota. 350 million or something like that. Yeah. Because, and even in England, I remember watching Muslim clerics, I told you about the Jizia, is, you know, what Christians would pay in tribute to their overlord, Muslim overloads. And you watch Muslims saying, yeah, we take welfare from you guys because it's jizia. It's our rightfully earned money.

They just say that. So that's the mentality? That's the mentality. It's justified by that doctrine. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. There's one.

I saw a Pakistani cleric, Sheikh Anjim Douda, Chowdh, Chowdhry, Pakistani in Britain. And there was a video of me. I don't know if it's gone now, but there was a video of him where he says that, jokingly. He's like, of course we get our welfare. It's Jizya. They owe it to us. That's the doctrine they used to justice. I didn't know that.

That's a mentality. Okay. Let me, so let me, let me gear shit a little bit. Well, hey, before we get back. to the episode, I want to tell you about something coming up at Lake Point that we're really excited about this summer. We're hosting at the movies, a four-week sermon series where we'll use movie clips and stories to illustrate powerful biblical truths. It's one of the most fun and creative experiences we do all year here at Lake Point, and it's designed for the entire family. And so every weekend at our physical locations will feature unique movie-themed experiences, fun characters in the lobby for both kids and adults.

Incredible worship and practical teaching from the Word of God. And of course, popcorn and drinks for everyone. So whether you are here and maybe you're a long-time churchgoer, someone who's been away from church for a while, or maybe you're looking for an easy way to invite a friend, neighbor, or coworker to church, this right here is the perfect series for you. At the Movies is an in-person only event

and begins July 11 and 12th and continues through August 1 and 2. And so if you're in the Dallas area, we'd love for you to join us at one of our campuses. You can find service times, locations, and more information by texting the word ATM to 204.1. one. Now, let's get back to the conversation. So, like, stuff like this constantly, it goes pretty viral. Like, man, it's, like, very high view, count reach. So, like, there was a couple guys,

a couple pastors on, quote-unquote pastors, I don't know these guys, so I'm hesitant to give that title, that were on Tucker recently. And, dude, this blew up. I mean, I don't know if you, actually, I know you did see it. And this episode, I mean, it went, it was very significant. So, like, I want to show, I just want to show you this kind of thing. I mean, there's millions of views, okay? And it's the kind of thing you see, you know, quite frequently. So let me show you this. Do you have it chopped up in the same clips, Trinity? No, there was, well, we'll do our best here. You tell me when you want to pause and respond to something he says. And we'll just kind of, you tell Trinity when you want to pause. But this is the type of thing that it's in the mainstream,

gets injected in the mainstream, and it taints how people think about stuff. Okay, so yeah, go ahead and toss that. The Ottomans didn't charge Church's tax. And so when the Ottomans were in control of the promised land for 400 years, in the Millet system, they didn't charge Church's tax. Israel started just a few years ago. Pause. Yes, no. This reminds me of the John Esposito quote, the four centuries of peaceful coexistence because he says four centuries.

And it's just as bad, what he's saying? You know, so no, this is, okay, this is like he's comparing apples and oranges, right? Okay, you're comparing four centuries under Ottoman rule with Christians living in Israel. And it's just, okay, here's what happened under the Ottomans. You're not a citizen, okay? You're a them, me, you pay tribute. You're not, you don't have equality with fellow Muslims. Under Israel, you're a Christian, you're a citizen.

Yeah, you do have equality, all right? you had to pay tributes, you had to pay all this, and if you don't, you get killed or sold into slavery. That doesn't exist in Israel, all right? And so what do you say? The 400 years. Oh, and then he's talking about a tax about how Israel, there's a tax going on right now, which, and his point is, and the Ottomans didn't tax churches. And this is, to me, it's such a disingenuous thing to say, because literally they didn't tax churches, but they taxed the Christian communities almost to death to exist. So that was part of it.

With the jizia? Yeah. Okay. So it's a one big tax. You guys don't give it. We're going to kill you. And then once you've done it, okay, you have your little church in your little village and you better not repair it or enlarge it.

That's what it is. You're telling me that's better than what Israel does with churches. Churches aren't taxed. And what they're referring to. Actually, just to interject, we have a church partner in Israel that we fund. They do great. they're doing just fine. Yeah.

Yeah. So it's just, it's beyond, I have no problem if he was, you know, if they're criticizing Israel because of the things that we see like the spitting on the Christians or a soldier destroying a Jesus statue. Okay, that's fine. But that is a far cry from what happened to Christians under Ottoman rule. So I'll tell you this. Like here's one aspect that did, okay, I told you to be, to be a Christian under Ottoman rule,

you're basically second class citizen. Now, there was a, a time due to the colonial era that they pride because the western powers were so strong, especially Russia, they pressured the Ottoman Empire to give Christians, Christian subjects, equal rights. When that happened, the Muslims flipped out and there were mass pogroms against Christians. And in just like something like, which means what? Like they just would invade Christian villages and slaughter tens of thousands of them and rape them and mutilate them. All right. And the Ottomans would look the other way. Why? Because how dare you, Christian?

Christian actually be my equal. All right. So that was the mentality of the Ottoman Empire. Is that what's going on in Israel where actually you have Christians who are citizens and who, you know, the spitting and all that, okay, but that's not what the Ottomans did. Like literally. And then and then when there was war, so we can look at what's happening, you know, Israel is at war and now Christians are suffering more. Okay, but are they being targeted? I don't know. I don't think so. I mean, it's just war, right? When the war happened, World War I The Ottomans, and this was well known, Churchill, there's a quote where he says, yeah, they use the fog of war to do what they've always wanted to do, which is a genocide of Christians. So I'm talking about the Armenian. Churchill said this. Yeah. I'm talking about the Armenian genocide, the Assyrian genocide, the Middle Eastern Christian genocides of the Holy Land. 2.5 million. Systematically were killed.

So if you look at Israel and Christians at peace compared to Ottomans and Christians at peace, Israel wins out. If you look at war, yeah, Israel. wins out because once war started, a genocide was launched against Christians. War is going on now with Israel and Lebanon and there's Christians there, but it's lamentable when anyone dies, especially a Christian, but I don't think they're targeting them out of hatred the way the Ottomans and the Muslims did. All right. Keep going, Trini. And, you know, so that Christians have pressure applied to them. I mean, native believers, the ones whose churches have been there longer than Israel has been a state, they're the ones that are facing the pressure that it's very hard to get Christians

in America to care about at all. And their Muslim rulers didn't do that during the Ottoman period. Okay, so the answers no. You tell me when you want to. The Muslim rulers didn't tax churches during the Ottoman period. They were very kind to Christians. As a matter of fact, they took care of our holy sites. They had rebuilt Islamic authorities, rebuild.

the church of the sepulchre three different times over the centuries. All right. Let me tell you what he's talking about. First of all, the Ottomans were very kind to Christians. That's worse than John Esposito talking about, which is saying something, right? That, I mean, I already gave you an example of what the Ottomans did to Christians. The Ottoman policy was Janissaries, or they would go into Christian villages, and once they have been subdued, and take the healthiest, strongest boys,

and force them, take them young, convert them forcibly into Islam, and train them to become jihadists. Ten years later, when they're ferocious and indoctrinated, they send them back to their Christian families to conquer them again, okay? Does that sound very kind to you? They would take their prettiest girls,

throw them in harems, right? Destroy churches constantly. I just told you a genocide, mutilation, raping Armenian girls and then crucifying them, okay? This is very kind. I mean, that line that he just said, I mean, I know that very well, because I already responded to it, and so has everyone else. It's so absurd.

But as far, and look at what he says. I actually did a video about him and what you do about that clip where it's kind of weird. I'm not saying that he's a Muslim, but he's engaged in an Islamic doctrine of deception, which it's called Taurea. And basically what Taurea is, is, I can lie to you. and it's okay in Islam, as long as what I'm saying is literally true, but even though it's deceptive. So an example is you ask me, hey, Ray, can I borrow 20 bucks? And I tell you, I don't have a dime in my pocket.

You're going to walk away thinking I'm telling you I have no money. But I might have wads of $20. I just don't have a dime in my pocket. Oh, okay. So that's not a lie. Okay. Interesting. Yeah.

So it's funny because the first thing he said is, yeah, they didn't, the Ottomans didn't tax churches, which is true, but he doesn't tell you that they were taxing. and extorting the Christians themselves to death, right? Fascinating. And here he says, and, you know, they built, they took care of our holy sites. They rebuilt the Holy Sepulchre three times. He doesn't tell you that it was the Muslims who destroyed the Holy Sepulchre three times. Okay.

That seems like an important point. Yeah. And that how they took care and rebuilt it, the Muslims, was that the Christians were up in arms because that was the most holy site. And at one point, for example, Russia was going to invade. and so they allowed the Christians to rebuild it, their own money, their own labor, and also a lot of caliphs always wanted the Holy Sepulchre

because it was a massive source of income and revenue because pilgrims from all around Europe would come and they'd have to pay the caliphate. So it was even from a pragmatic point of view. It's like economic. Yeah, you want to keep it open. It was actually, most people don't know this, the Holy Sepulchre was torn to the ground, right, in 1009,

by a caliph, by the Muslim authorities that are very kind to Christians. totally pulverized. And then maybe 40 years later, another Caliph decided, okay, he allowed the Byzantines to rebuild it. And it's clearly because he basically said, so I can get revenue and income. Okay.

So, but is that how it comes off the way he says it? No, they took care of our holy sites. Three times they rebuilt it. Because, you know, there were earthquakes and things, and they just, out of altruism, they went and rebuilt it for us. Yeah. So it's kind of interesting that he's doing this. Raya thing. I'm not saying he's a Muslim

but maybe he has Muslim friends and he's learned a couple of tactics. Okay. Was that the end of that clip, Trinney? Okay. So let me ask you this. So this is something I think a lot of people are confused by. So like in the United States, in general, you have a lot of elections happening right now. This is kind of why I first reached out to you. You got Mom Donnie up there in New York City, Rashid Taleb.

You've got a lot of the DSA candidates that are Democratic Socialists of America. You have this Chevalier girl that was just a lot of, up there in New York City that's like, you know, Muslim girl attended a rally after October 7th celebrating the slaughter of the Jews, you know, that literally has public quotes. Actually, will you just, do you have those from the Chevalier, those Chevalier? Like, this is a girl that just won an election up there. Do the blue one first, Trinity? No, the blue one first, right there. So she's the one, yeah, that was elected, Democratic rep, loses primary to Mom Donny-backed Dary Eliza, Avila, Chevalier, this you got.

Go to that next one that you got right there. Nope, the other one. You've got it already pulled up. Yeah, that one right there. She's like on record. Like, we are fighting for the total eradication of Western civilization. And then you go to the next one that you have underneath that. Yep.

And then, you know, like just openly hates the United States. I forgot to get an napkin, so I wipe my hand on the American flag behind me. She calls white women ugly colonizers. She, like I said, attended the rally after October 7th celebrating the slaughter of the Jews. She's for abolition of all borders and prisons. Calls the United States a disgrace of a country. U.S. service members are war criminals. And you have more and more elections that are kind of moving that way.

Now, what I think is confusing to a lot of people, especially Christians in America, is they're always, they're always progressive. So like we got this little clip of Mamdani right here. You got that, Trinity, this little clip of Mondani. And this is very normal. You know, he's at a pride parade. So this is like, this is him out there, it's a pride parade. And that's pretty normal for like some of the Muslims that are getting elected.

And I don't know anything about them. Like maybe that's how they feel. But I think people look at that, this alliance of like the progressive left and Muslims. And they're like, wait. You guys are supposed to be for women's rights, but it's like, that's not the vibe of, you know, Islam. And you guys are for LGBT, quote unquote, rights. And that's not, so, like, let me just ask, like, what is going on in your mind? It makes perfect sense to me.

What's going on is you have to see beyond it all. And this is now we have to get spiritual and talk about religion. And it's, it's, what's going on is, yeah, you're absolutely right. These are two antithetical mentalities. I mean, Muslims are draconian, you know, patriarchal, not. homosexual friendly, and then you have the left, which is the exact opposite. So how does that work? That's what you're asking. How do they comport? And I think it comes down to the idea of the enemy of my enemies, my friend. And both of them have the same enemy, which is basically Christian civilization.

That's the way I see it. And they're coming from different angles. And this actually, this does have precedence, again, but most people don't know it. If you go back in time and you had the medieval Christian world, we know the Muslims were attacking it, right? But, also the pagans. And guess what? They were often allied with each other. Fascinating. And they both hated it for the same reason. Vikings destroying crosses, Muslims destroying crosses. Okay. So in many ways, I see the left as the descendants of the pagans and the Muslims are the descendants of the Muslims. And they still have the same enemy. But, you know, unfortunately, for most Westerners and most Christians, they don't get that.

And it's an alliance of convenience. So for example, we just saw Mamdami with the, you know, the flag and all that sort of thing. And maybe you're familiar with this story. I think it's in Hamtramic. I've heard of it. Michigan. The guy that got elected, yep. Yeah, where basically it's, last I heard, the city council is a Muslim majority. Yeah. And it was the left that went out of their way to bring them in and empower them and represent them. And once they became the majority of the city of the city council, they canceled gay pride. Yeah. First thing. First thing, right? So again. So then all the progressives felt betrayed. Yes. Well, and, but, But they're idiots because, of course, I mean, that's, that is Islam. Islam's not on your side.

But they're both helping each other because their true enemy is the Christian body, is really Christianity. And, but it's not, the media doesn't show it that way. Nobody's going to discuss it that way. But that's why you can get two diametrically opposed forces who are working in cahoots because what they really hate is us. Dude, that's honestly, so like, if I, so, you know, if I, like, take off my history head and take off the history conversation I just put on like the Bible conversation. There's a really interesting thread and I'm interested, I'm sure you've seen this, but Muslims in general, they like to claim heritage from Ishmael, that's correct. Okay. So what you have in general

is you have for people who are listening is obviously Abraham's born, the covenant's given to Abraham, the child of the promise is Isaac and then the child that's not is Ishmael. So what really becomes interesting is you have, you have one covenant, but you have two sons. sons. Well, now you've got a problem. And what Islam historically does is they claim Ishmael and obviously Jewish people. And then there's a whole Romans 11 theology of Christians are grafted into the covenant promises that people give given to the Jews. And so what we would go is, well, man, we're kind of team Isaac. So our spiritual dissentists. Now, what's interesting is, man, you fast forward. And those two essentially brothers and spiritual lineages are really striving against each other

for the rest of Old Testament history. Now, where it kind of gets interesting, you may think I'm crazy, but I'm just going to, I'll just do it. What's interesting to me is you get at John 16. In John chapter 16, Jesus is talking by the end. He's talking about in times. Eschatology is, you know, the theological word. And he says, the time is coming when they will kill you

and think they are offering service to God. Now, I just want to point this out. I think what a lot of Christians have thought for the last 50 or 60 years in America is, oh, you know what our big problem is? Secularism. secularisms are atheism and secularism are problem what that verse says is that the final boss at the end before Christ returns and he's gone is that actually a final boss will be some form of religion that thinks killing infidels is good and holy that's interesting

all right now you fast forward to the book of first and second Thesslonians first and second Thessalonians and I'm going to put on my tinfoil hat here and take this all this with grain of salt First and second Thessalonians talk about how before Christ returns, there will be a, quote, great delusion that deludes mass numbers of people, like mass numbers of people. We don't know what it is. The Bible is intentionally vague. But it will be some form of religion, philosophy, ideology that is explicitly antichrist. That's interesting to me. Now, fast forward again to Revelation 20. In Revelation 20, the Apostle John has given a vision at the end.

of the throne of Christ before, I think like in the era when he's going to return. And I'm just going to read what the verse says. It says the souls of those who had been, and it says, it doesn't just say who had been killed. It specifies the type of death that those people will have experienced. And it says those who had been beheaded because they refused to worship the beast. Now I just want to point this out. There is one religion and one religion only.

that I am aware of, you might correct the record, that has some specific directions on how to kill people that they disagree with. If I understand it right, the Quran calls it striking necks is what it's called. Okay, that's interesting to me. Now, if you want to do this, you know, in the same way that I'm sure that Islam and other religions have multiple eschatological views, so views of how the end times will play out. I just want to know what you think about all this when I'm done. In the Old Testament, it's in the book of Zechariah, a lot of people think that what that, and there's an end times prophecy in the book of Zechariah. A lot of Bible scholars, I think. And it's talking about what happened and that essentially all of these nations

will gather together and unite to destroy Israel, to come against Israel. And it lists the name of the nations. Now, the names that it lists in the Old Testament, the Old Testament names are Gog and Magog, Meshech and Tubal. I'll probably pronounce some of these wrong. Persia, Cush, Put, Gomer and then Beth Torgama. Those are the Old Testament names. Now, but if you take the geographic regions that corresponded to those names and then you go, well, what are the 21st century equivalents of those nations that it lists? They are, Gog and Megag would be Russia.

That's kind of, you know, where it is right now. Turkey, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Turkey again, Turkey again. Now, I just want to point this out, all of those are predominantly Muslim nations, except one, that'd be Russia. But in Russia, the fastest growing religion by far, from what I understand, is Islam. So all I'll say is, man, I'm not a guy who opens my Bible, and I'm like, I'm going to put on a tinfoil hat and here's your chart, and I know exactly what's going to happen. That stuff is stuff is something you've laid your eyes on? You got thoughts on that? Well, I'm very familiar with what you're talking about.

You're not going to hurt my feelings if you're like, eh. I'm more of a preterist, partial preterist, which means... Yeah, I'm familiar. Yeah, which means I actually think most of the prophecies were actually fulfilled at the time. They're not necessarily talking. 80, 70. Yeah, yeah. So, and I think, and, you know, a lot of people always feel like we're in the end times.

But if you're familiar with history, it's like, man, we've been doing way worse. People have been thinking that for 2,000 years. Yeah. Imagine, imagine, like, living in 1240s in Russia, and for like, two, for three thousand miles, everything's burned and there's just pyramids of heads, you know, would you think that's the end times? Yep. Yep. Because a Mongol horde just swept through. Yeah.

So, you know, horrific stuff's been going on. That's right. And, you know, much worse, actually, in many ways. I do believe in the great delusion. And I think what we're discussing and what we call the left and wokeism, that is all part of the delusion. and the, you know, when we talk about, like I tell you what the West is doing today is unprecedented because it's naive, that all of that I think is, is part of that delusion. So that definitely makes sense to me. But my thing with prophecies, and this is probably unpopular,

but I'm very much moved by what Jesus said, which is like no one knows, that he's the angels. But I do know one thing. A lot of these prophecies, you know, we think about them and we obsess about And it makes sense. I get it. It's logical because we think it's going to be in our lifetime, possibly, and that's exciting. But here's the thing. I can already guarantee you and everyone that, yes, within your lifetime, you will see the end times. It's called the day you die. Yeah, right? When you die, that is equivalent to the end times because it's like a scroll unfolding. There you go. And that's going to happen. It might happen today. It might happen a few decades from now. So I don't get caught up in like all these theories about times date seasons.

Yeah, because, and especially after Jesus says, nobody knows, not even the angels, right? So why would I, I already know I'm going to die and I'm temporal and my time is pretty short in a big picture of things. So I don't have to even think about that sort of thing. That's right. But I'm not, and I'm not, you know, trying to, I'm not trying to like condemn it or push it. Oh, no. Anyone who wants to go with that, just to me I don't find it very useful. And it's kind of like, it's like a bunch of rabbit holes that you can go down and kind of get lost and loose sight of like what's really going on.

I mean, the bottom line is, yeah, time is up for all of us one way or the other. and you want to do the right thing and you want to make it a better place and you know and ultimately I've reached the point I think you know the entire life journey is just all about trying to ascertain and to live according to the truth

that's it. That's great. That's actually what we all do one way or the other you know and so yeah prophecies that they did happen they will happen I think that's fine I have no problem with any of that but I don't want to and I unfortunately do believe it's also being it's like a market

it's it's an industry where people, you know, you know what I mean. Totally. Yeah. Totally. Yeah. So that actually really, really leaves a bad taste in my mouth because I know people are manipulating it for, you know, whatever political gain or whatever the message is.

Again, that's not to say I don't believe there's a judgment day or an end time. I just think it's not for me. For me, it's simple enough trying to get by the day. I'm following Jesus. We might see how it all works out. Yeah. That's it. Yeah.

All right, let me end on this. So hopefully a note of hope. And also, I'm interested to hear how you'll answer this question. So first of all, there's these cool stories about lots of Muslims converting to Christ in certain parts of the world. And we've even got, like, one of our international mission partners with Laypoint, he's a guy whose dad was an imam. And this guy literally has a dream, the man in white kind of thing. He has a dream about the man in white going, amen. Essentially, I'm him.

and then a missionary comes and he realizes like that's the guy and was Jesus. Okay. So that's like literally how we got one of our international mission partners. And it's been really cool. Like at our church, we're starting to see like a weird number of Muslims come to Christ at Lake Point. So like I'm walking around campuses and people are telling me like, you know, their families are five, six generations deep Muslim families. and here they're worship in Jesus. So there's some cool stuff happening there.

I would just ask this question. I'm curious how you respond to this because that's what we want. We want to reach people for Christ, you know. That's like our thing. What would you say to like a Muslim person who they're listening to a podcast like this? They're peeking their head in a lake point.

They're hearing me. I'm just opening up in Bible, teaching verse by verse every week. And honestly, they're hearing it and they're watching it. And they're beginning to have some doubts about Islam and, you know, all the things. And maybe for the first time in their life, they're considering Christianity, maybe a little nervous about it.

If you're talking to that person, what would you say? Well, you know, it depends on which country and what kind of Muslim they are because, you know, there's various cultural factors that might, you know, pose ill for them. We were talking about apostasy. I mean, there's families that'll kill you, right?

And there's more liberal ones. countries like in Morocco and Tunisia, Lebanon. So, yeah. But what I would say is, you know, I mean, look, the whole polemics against Islam, this is an ancient thing amongst Christians, and rightfully so, and apologetics for Christianity and trying to bring them. So this has been going on for a long time, and I think it should go on. This is actually one of the best ways to deal with the Islam problem, right?

The thing you have to remember is, you know, and this is why Islam is such a problem in the secular West, because it has, you can't, you can't, you have to fight fire with fire. Muslims are believers. They believe in God. They believe in, you know, called in doing right works. A lot of the works isn't bad. A lot of it is considered, you know, it's not like everything they do is evil, okay?

People sometimes have that idea. So in order to get to a Muslim, you have to fight fire with fire, which means you're not going to supplant to their religion by telling them about secularism and human rights. You have to actually talk to them about something like Christianity. That will resonate. I used to watch, his name was Father Zechariah Boutros, he was a priest. And his shows are all in Arabic. And he was one of the most hated priests in the Islamic world

because he would actually, a lot of Muslims would convert because he would get into the Quran and the Hadith and talk about the Bible. And he was a polemicist. And what he did worked because he was fighting fire with fire. He was going against a religion with a religion. going against the holy book with a holy book, going against the God with a God. And I think that's what you definitely need to do. This is why when Muslims, it's amazing.

If you look at Muslims in the West, the problematic ones are the ones who have been born there, two, three, four generations. It's not the guy that just came over. Isn't that weird? And that's because I believe Western culture, the more hedonistic and nihilistic it becomes, the more it pushes them back to something, to some kind of faith, because Islam is better than that. Believe it or not.

Yeah. So I'm all for Christian proselytization of Muslims. I do believe there's a lot of sincere converts. And I think that's because they are, there's a lot of good Muslims who are searching for the truth. And that's why these stories you're talking about Christ appearing to them. They're just everywhere. And they, you know, cross cultures, it's not, it's like a, it's a real phenomenon. It's not something that just, you know, it's happening in one area.

It happens in Africa and Iran and Asia. So I do believe that's real. But as far as, you know, what to say, I'm not a great proselytizer. I'm more of a, you know, simple historian. But I would just, you know, make the arguments. You know, the smart way is first you dismantle the Quran, but then you have to give it something in place, which would be the Bible. And that's why secularism doesn't work. You want to dismantle it and supplant it with secular humanism.

That's just not appealing. I'm sorry, it's not appealing for Muslims and Arabs and people from that world. It doesn't make sense. So yeah. That's great. Well, you can do the history and I'll do the proselytization. All yours. Hey, Remedy, Bram, thank you.

Thank you for what you do. Thank you for your writing. I'm going to keep reading your stuff. Thank you for your time. I appreciate it. Pastor John. I really do. Thanks for having me.

Yes, sir.