Reason #58: Converts to Islam come from all walks of life

WhyIChoseIslamLeave a comment

When you hear the stories of people who converted to Islam and analyze their backgrounds, you will come to a profound conclusion – that they come from all walks of life.

There are former Christians, Jewish people, Hindus, and Buddhists who converted to Islam.

Atheists, agnostics, and former Muslims as well.

So have Islamophobes!

Kids who haven’t reached puberty and people in their 80s and 90s.

Converts also come from all ethnicities. You can find stories of Native Americans converting. People in remote villages in the middle of nowhere. Israelis who grew up in Israel. Who would’ve guessed?

As Allah told Prophet Muhammad, and consequently anyone who reads the Qur’an,

You surely cannot guide whoever you like ‘O Prophet’, but it is Allah Who guides whoever He wills, and He knows best who are ‘fit to be’ guided.

[Qur’an 28:56]

Guidance is in the Hands of God, not us. We have no idea who will become Muslim, nor who will leave it.

But the Qur’an also teaches that those who are sincere, humble, and look for guidance, they will find it. And that’s the only similarity you will find. You won’t it in their background or ethnicity, but you will in their personalities. Such people tend to be humbled by the truth, willing to accept it regardless of what it may be. So the question we have to have ourselves – how humble are we really?

Reason #57: Zamzam, a living miracle on Earth?

WhyIChoseIslamLeave a comment
From Ikhlasul Amal at Flickr.com

What if I told you there is a living physical miracle on Earth, would you then believe in God? That’s the question you have to ask yourself before you are told of anything that might be a miracle. What is your mindset? If something clearly cannot be explained scientifically, will you dismiss it or as at least consider that something supernatural is at play?

So what is Zamzam? It is water coming from a well in Makkah, Saudi Arabia. As Islamic traditions explain, when Prophet Abraham (peace be upon him) was ordered by God to leave Hajar and his son, Ismail, alone in the middle of the desert, a miracle happened. After his mother was looking tirelessly for people and water, Ibn Abbas, the companion and cousin of Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ), explained that Angel Gabriel hit the ground with his heel and water gushed out.1 From that moment thousands of years ago, we have the water well today.

So for thousands of years, in the middle of the desert, from the time of Abraham to this day2, a water source has been supplying millions and millions of people. When you see the well, or visit Makkah and Madinah and see the countless people drinking the water at any given moment, and contemplate how gallons and gallons of it are being transported throughout the world, it’s incomprehensible. How is any of that possible? To add, to this day, we don’t know the source of it. How is it not linked to another water source? How is the water still coming? Surely, it would have dried up by now… but it hasn’t.

  1. Sahih al-Bukhari 3365.
  2. Except a brief period before Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) when the well was lost.