Imam Dr. Abdullah Hakim Quick is a Director at the Canadian Council of Imams.
Answering a question about “Muslims Living in a Non-Muslim Land”, Abdullah Hakim Quick said:
“He [member of the audience] says today there are a lot of groups that talk to you and tell you to leave the country because it is impure and go back to your home yet whenever they run into trouble they come to Canada for help. I’m sixteen years old was born in Canada and English is my first language, I can speak Arabic fluently, originally from Egypt, but I live here and plan to stay here. What right do they have to do this? This area of Hijra [countries under a non-Muslim rule] is a very long discussion, and I don’t believe that there’s any set answer to this, and I remember a number of years ago Sheikh Jaafar Sheikh Idris [prominent Sudanese Muslim scholar], he was in ISNA [Islamic Society of North America] at the Zorro convention in Canada. He made a statement and he said he cannot see any anything in the Islamic law that gives the right for Muslims to be living in Canada in America today. There is no proof that we should be here, that we are living in haram [forbidden area]. Okay, now and he was being sincere because if you look in the books you don’t find anything, because there was never been a precedent where Muslims leave the Abode of Islam and they migrate to the Abode of Disbelief. The leave the Abode of Islam and go to the Abode of Disbelief. There’s no precedent for this amongst the scholars, and the people chased Sheikh Jaafar into his room and they kept him up all night to the next day he had to come back. And he revised the statement, okay, showing the flexibility of a scholar and he said: Yes. Because people made a legitimate argument that sometimes you’re leaving the Muslim world because of you’re oppressed. In some parts of the Muslim world if I was to say this is what I’m saying now the secret police to be waiting for me right there. It’s okay Mister Hakim, please [come] to the jail. You’re welcome. Right away, okay. I think there’s even a copy of the Mujtama [Islamic magazine ] they talk about freedom in Canada, the recent Mujtama magazine, and talking about freedom and some look at people like me or someone else like we’re mad men we’re crazy. But that is not because we’re mad men that is because one good part of Canada and America is that they give you freedom of speech. This is one good part of this area which supposed to be Islamic. They give you freedom of speech and not gonna take you to jail just because you say something. Of course if you start going too far, then there is obscenity laws, okay, but basically you can express your opinion, right. So there’s no set answer. If Allah Willing there is a Caliph [Leader of the Islamic State] who arises then we would be obligated to go to that area and may Allah raise that Caliph up. “If Allah Willing there is a Khalifa [Caliph, rulers of the Islamic State, Caliphate] who arises then we would be obligated to go to that area. May Allah raise this Khalifa up.”