Yusuf Islam Relates the Story of His Success

as a Pop Star, of His Illness, and of His Perplexing

Questions, Ending it with His Conversion to Islam

We conclude our talk about the faith journey which led Cat Stevens to converting to Islam, to changing his name to Yusuf Islam, to giving up music and singing immediately and to devoting his life to Da`wa. Yusuf Islam described his conversion to Islam as a victory from Allah and guidance from the Most Gracious and Most Merciful. He went on to say : “When Allah wants to guide His servant to the light of faith, He makes things easy for him and offers him the means. Allah has granted the human being a mind so as to show him the right path in this life. Allah created Man and made him His Vicegerent on Earth, which is to be inherited by His devout servants. This is why it is important that the human being understands his obligation toward himself, to save it from illusions and to prepare for the Hereafter with good deeds. Anyone who loses this opportunity -that of preparing for the Hereafter- will never get such an opportunity again. For it is not reasonable that Allah brings him back and back to life to prepare for his Afterlife.”

Yusuf Islam also said : “I grew up in the luxurious life of the modern world. Moreover, I led the comfortable life of famous pop stars. I was born within a Christian family, but we know that each child is born innocent and pure. It is his parents who turn him into a Jew or into a Christian. My father gave me Christianity. This is what I thought. I learnt, since childhood, that God exists, but there was no direct communicating with Him, but only through Jesus Christ (PBUH), who was for us the gate to God. This is what we learnt in our childhood. I accepted some of this to a certain extent, but I could not swallow it all.”

My talks with Yusuf Islam took place at different periods ; I carried them out whenever we met in Islamic meetings, conferences and seminars inside and outside Britain. He used to ask me to follow some important aspects of his faith journey in some references including books, the British press, and finally video and audio tapes which contain some aspects of his biography and the story of his conversion to Islam.

I may mention in this respect that in the exhibition of the Islamic Union of North America which was organized on the occasion of the annual conference of the Union in Chicago, a section was devoted to Yusuf Islam’s books and records which were well received by the public. There were long queues of admirers who wanted to get an autographed copy of his new book which was sold out on the first day.

Yusuf Islam said that, before he converted to Islam, he used to look at Jesus Christ’s statues and found that they were no more than stone without life. When Christians said that God is three (the Trinity) he got more perplexed, but was unable to discuss or debate this issue. He added : “I used to believe that this was true to a certain extent, because I learnt from childhood that I have to respect the religion of my father.”

He went on to say : “I started to gradually get away from this religious education and turn toward singing and music. I desired to become a pop star; thus, I started to get influenced by all the things I saw in films and in the media. Perhaps, I thought that this was the god that would help me fulfil my objective in amassing wealth. I had an uncle who possessed a beautiful car, so I started telling myself that he had a lot of money which allowed him to achieve what he desired, and that people who were around him then influenced him and made him think that money was the god in this world. And this world of his uncle is their god.

At that time, I decided that this was my life and to amass wealth so as to have a great life. I made pop stars my ideal models. I started to release songs, but deep in me there was a feeling of humanity, namely that when I became a rich person I would help the poor.

What happened was that I became very famous while I was still an adolescent. My name and pictures filled British newspapers and magazines. The media made of me a great man, bigger than life itself. This is why I wanted to live longer than life, i.e. to live life in its length and width, so to speak. The only way to achieve that was to get intoxicated with alcohol and drugs.

After one year of achieving material success and leading a luxurious life, I was diagnosed with tuberculosis and entered hospital. At that time I started to think about what would happen to me, and started wondering : “What will happen to me ? Am I just a body ? Is my goal in life only to satisfy this body ?” I realized that this disaster was a blessing from God and an opportunity to open my eye and question myself about the reason why I was there and why I was lying in bed. I started to search for some answers to these questions. At that time there was some interest in Eastern mysticism ; I started to read, and the first thing I understood was about death and the moving of the spirit from one body to another. I started to cure myself and became vegetarian. Then I was convinced of peace and the force of flowers. This became a general tendency, not only for me but also for a lot of people. Yet, I believed then that I consisted only of a body. This was what I realised in hospital.

I realised that I had a will which was a gift from God. It is necessary to yield to God’s Will. I started studying Eastern religions. After that, I was dissatisfied with Christianity so I returned to the music world and started to write songs once again. This time I made my songs reflect my private ideas. I became more famous in the music world. I faced very difficult times because I became rich and famous at the same time. I started to sincerely search for the truth.

I reached a stage when I was convinced that Buddhism was good and noble, but I was not prepared to give up my life style, for I was living life with its clamour and did not want to be a Buddhist priest and seclude myself from society.

I tried to reconsider the Bible but did not find anything. At this time I did not know anything about Islam. Then, something which I consider a miracle happened, namely that my brother visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem and was very impressed by this visit, for when he saw the Mosque full of life while churches and temples were empty, he felt that an atmosphere of peace and tranquillity prevailed in the Mosque.

When he returned to London, he brought me a copy of the translation of the meanings of the Holy Qur’an, which he gave me as a present. At the time he had not become Muslim, but he felt that there was something in this religion and thought that I would perhaps find something in it, too.

When I received the book as a guide which clarified everything for me: Who I am ? What is the purpose of life ? What is reality ? Where did I come from ? Then I realized that this was the true Religion. In the West, anyone who wants to embrace a religion and consider it as his only way in life is described as an extremist, and I am not an extremist. In the beginning, I was unable to choose between body and soul; then, I realized that body and soul are not separate and that it is not necessary for you to go to the top of the mountain in order to become a devout person. Therefore, we should follow Allah’s Will ; we would thus become superior to angels. The first thing I wanted to do then was to become Muslim. I realized that Allah owns everything, created everything and is capable of everything. At this point I started to lose my self-delusion, for I was thinking that the reason for my existence lied in my augustness. Yet, I realised that I did not create myself and that the goal of my existence in this life is to obey Allah’s commandments and worship the Cherisher and Sustainer of the Worlds; and this is crystal clear in the Islamic religion. At this point I started to discover my faith and to feel that I had become a Muslim by reading the Holy Qur’an. Now I realized that all the prophets had been sent by Allah to carry one Message ; therefore, why have Jews and Christians disagreed ? I knew now why the Jews reject Christ as a Messenger from God, hence their distortion of the Word to the extent that Christians misunderstood God’s Word and claimed that Jesus was the son of God. Everything became meaningful, and this is the beauty of the Holy Qur’an, it addresses your mind and gives you the causes as well as it makes you avoid worshipping the Sun or the Moon, and worship the One Who created everything instead.

Whenever I read the Holy Qur’an, I find that it talks about prayer (Salat), kindness, mercy and generosity. This happened before I became Muslim. After this I felt that the only answer to my confusion lied in the Holy Qur’an and in the fact that Allah sent His Book to me as a cause for my guidance so I kept it secretly. I started to understand its meanings at another level. Next, I decided to travel to Jerusalem as my brother had done. In Jerusalem, I went to the Al-Aqsa Mosque and sat there. When someone questioned me about what I wanted, I informed him that I was a Muslim. He asked about my name. I answered, ‘Stevens’, he seemed perplexed. When prayer was at hand, I joined the ranks of the praying worshippers.”

Yusuf Islam continued relating the story of his conversion, stating : “In London, I met a Muslim woman by the name of Nafissa, I informed her about my wish to publicly announce my embracing Islam, so she showed me the way to the Islamic Centre Mosque in London in Regent Park in 1977, one year and a half after receiving a copy of the Holy Qur’an. After the Friday Prayer, I went to the Imam to announce my conversion to Islam by saying the “Shahadatain”. I felt now that I would be in direct contact with Allah, unlike in Christianity or in any other religion. For the relationship between the servant and his God is direct in Islam.”

Islam concluded his talk as follows : “I want to say that I implore Allah to accept fully and well everything I do, as well as to make these experiences of mine an inspiration to other persons. Moreover, I would like to stress that I did not have contact with a Muslim person before my embracing Islam. I read the Holy Qur’an and realized there is no perfect person. Islam is the perfect religion. Had we followed the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah (PBUH) and made Him our model we would have achieve great success in both worlds (life and Afterlife)”.