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Islamic Scholar Dr Khalid Zaheer Visits University of Western Sydney
A series of very successful seminars were recently organised with visiting Islamic scholar, Dr Khalid Zaheer. Dr Zaheer is associated with ‘Understanding Islam UK’ (UIUK) since May 2012. UIUK is a non-political organisation established in UK as a registered charity since 2001. Prior to joining UIUK, Dr Zaheer was the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Central Punjab. Moreover, Dr Zaheer was also the Director Education at Al-Mawrid, an NGO established to promote research and education on Islam. It is worth noting here that Mr Javed Ahmad Ghamidi is the founder-president of the Al-Mawrid Institute of Islamic Sciences.
Dr Khalid Zaheer was invited to be the guest speaker at a seminar organised by Dr Aila Khan at the University of Western Sydney in Parramatta. In his speech, Dr Zaheer presented a list of misconceptions about Islam amongst Muslims. This was followed by a question-answer session which was moderated by Mr Kashif Amjad. Question topics varied from those related to interest to those involving personal relationships. Dr Khalid Zaheer pointed towards the need for overseas Muslims to preserve their values while also trying to integrate with the society at large.
In response to a query, Dr Zaheer expressed his opinion regarding the use of the word ‘kaafir’. Dr Zaheer explained how ‘kaafirs’ could be amongst Muslims as well as Non-Muslims. He also emphasized that Allah alone can judge who is - or is not - a ‘kaafir’. While answering different questions, Dr Zaheer explained how it took some people more than 20 years to accept the Holy Prophet’s (may peace be upon him) message, while living and working very close to him. Thus, in today’s world one should easily provide a leeway of more than 200 years for today’s Non-Muslims to accept God’s message.
