Rashad Khalifa: Difference between revisions

'''Rashad Khalifa''' (رشاد خليفة‎; November 19, 1935–January 31, 1990) was an Egyptian-American biochemist, closely associated with the United Submitters International, which promoted a heterodox [[Quranism|Quranist]] interpretation of Islam. Khalifa was responsible for popularizing the theory that the [[Qur'an|Quran]] is replete with [[Word Count Miracles in the Qur'an|numerological]] [[Islam and Miracles|miracles]] related to the number 19. He was [[List of Killings Ordered or Supported by Muhammad|assassinated]] by his former student Glen Cusford Francis (a.k.a. Benjamin Philips), a traditionalist radical, on January 31, 1990.

Rashad Khalifa, born in Egypt in 1935, obtained an honors degree from Ain Shams University in Egypt before emigrating to the United States in 1959. In the States, he completed a Master's Degree in biochemistry at Arizona State University and a Ph.D. at the University of California, Riverside. Khalifa acquired U.S. citizenship, married an American woman, and had two children with her, a daughter, Beth, and a son, Sam.  

==Religious activism==

==Assassination==

19 years after the murder, in 2009, 52-year-old Glen Cusford Francis (a.k.a. Benjamin Phillips) was arrested on suspicion of having killed Khalifa. Following arrest, Philips was extradited from Canada to the United States, where he was found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. Philips had been a student of Rashad Khalifa starting in January 1990 and disappeared after the killing. His arrest came about when his two identities were understood to belong to the same person.

Bilal Philips—a popular Saudi-educated Salafist Islamic preacher, scholar, and writer who tours Western countries—celebrated the assassination of Rashad Khalifa, the manner of its execution, and prayed for the reward of its perpetrator in the hereafter. Philips is now banned from Australia, the UK, Germany, Kenya, Bangladesh, the Philippines, and Denmark. In the United States, he was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, but has nonetheless been allowed to live in the country. Philips has lived for some time now in Canada. Most recently, he moved to Qatar.

{{Quote|{{citation|author=Bilal Philips|title=About Rashad Khalifa the Dajjal|publisher=YouTube|date=March 29, 2007|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0qi1xZFH4g&ab_channel=IslamStudios}}|The followers of Rashad Khalifa, they call themselves Submitters International [...] back in the 70s they claimed to have discovered the mathematical numerical miracle of the Quran [...] people were amazed, he became very popular in the MSA [Muslim Students Association], the MSA took him all around the country giving lectures. [...] Then, by 1979, at a conference--I think it was held in Morocco--he announced very confidently that from his calculations of the multiples of 19 and its intricacy in the Quran that he was able to determine the exact date of ''Yawm al-Qiyamah'' [The Day of Judgement] [...] Muslims now had to back off. Because, of course, if anyone claims they have knowledge of ''Yawm al-Qiyamah''--when the Angel Jibreel asked the prophet, peace be upon him, "When is the final hour?", he [Muhammad] said, "I don't know any more than you do!"--this was the prophet peace be upon him, and here is Rashad Khalifa saying "I know when the exact date of ''Yawm al-Qiyamah'' is"! And after that he just went from bad to worse--after that, he denied the sunnah altogether. [...] The next thing we know, he claimed, by the mid-80s, he claimed that he found from his mathematical calculations that two verses in the Quran were false! [...] Then by the late-80s, he claimed--what else--prophethood! He said, "I am the messenger of Allah, the 19 proves it." [...] '''Alhumdulillah ["all praise be to God"], [in] 1991, some brave brother went and assassinated him.''' He was assassinated in Tucson, Arizona. They found him in the morning, dead, stabbed to death--with his gun, he had his gun with him. And he had predicted, before that, that nobody would kill him. '''Because he was a false prophet of Allah, so this was actual proof to finish him off--he was assassinated. They looked high and low to find who it was [who assassinated him], but, alhumdulillah, whoever did it did it the right way--not telling anybody. [*laughs*] This thing had to be done. You do it, you're the only one who knows about it. Mashallah ["thus has God willed"]. May Allah give him paradise [*audience replies "ameen", or "amen"*]. So, that was the end of Rashad Khalifa.''' [...] And of course, you know, Rashad Khalifa, when he denied sunnah and everything else the religion became his own interpretation. In their mosque--I can't even call it a mosque really-- in Tucson, Arizona--let's call it a temple--in their temple, the men and women prayed side-by-side [...] The women, they don't wear hijab, they wear short sleeves [...] Sometimes, when he was not there, his wife used to lead salah [prayers] [...] '''In other words, he made his own religion. So somebody like that, we don't consider him to be--or that group, Submitters International, or the Ahmadiyya, or the Qadiyanis, Ghulam Ahmad's followers--we don't consider them to be a part of Islam.'''}}

==See Also==

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