Q&A with Arnold Yasin from Holland
AY: Would King Faisal have accepted the approach you have now on Islam?
SA: Well, I was a doctor but young student of Islam, 23 y/o in 1970 and he was a great scholar. Malik Faisal subscribed to Al-Islam and not to N2I which I had very skeptically grown up with. He had very similar ideas as we have today but the environment was not conducive even for the King.
The Grand Mufti of the Kingdom, Sheikh Abdul Aziz Bin Baaz was a staunch N2I and was he a powerful blind man, O My God! And so were the other elite in the Kingdom, all N2I.
I consider Malik Faisal Shaheed my first true living Qur’anic teacher. Masjid, school and neighborhood, had all been N2I. Fortunately, my elders were all very moderate and took ritualism very lightly. I regard Allama Iqbal (d. 1938) as my first Islamic and philosophical mentor posthumously through his powerful Urdu and Persian poetry (I was born in 1947, 9 years after the great Allama died).
AY: Is he the same King that financed M.Bucaille?
SA: Yes, when he was the Crown Prince and also Leopold Weiss (Muhammad Asad).
AY: How was your life with the Bedouins?
SA: Oh, Wow! Excellent! They are very hospitable and grateful people. I used to treat anyone who would approach me day or night. The tough desert life has made them very shrewd. They are able to recognize sincerity before you blink.
The Bedouins brought sheep and goats, dates and fruit and all kinds of gifts at our beautiful home every day so that I could host the non-stop lines of affectionate visitors. Amazingly, most of the time we never knew who left the gift items in our front-yard at night! Such was their selflessness. Their families would help my wife and mother in the huge kitchen all the time 7d/wk and keep the house neat.
The government, the Saudis including the nomads honored my parents who visited us twice a year when my father got 45 days of vacation from his work in Karachi. They used to request them to let our whole family stay in Saudi Arabia all our lives. Hundreds of Saudi men, women and children were crying when we were finally departing in 1980.
AY: Do you still have contact with the Royal Family?
SA: Our family left Saudi Arabia during the gentle Malik Khalid’s rein primarily for the education of our little kids, back home to the USA. Fahd as the crown prince had little liking for me since I had to consistently decline his indulgences, wine and dance parties etc. So, there has been an absolute breakdown of communication with the royal family from 1982 until today. Fahd became the King in 1982.
“SHARAB, SHABAB, KEBAB” (Wine, beautiful women and rolled lamb kebobs) was the motto of Fahd’s life. He was lewd and indecent like King Saud bin Abdul Aziz. He had a one way love affair with the British P.M. Margaret Thatcher. Almost instinctively he used to call her the most gorgeous and sexy woman on earth, “Want to see a heavenly houri? See Margaret!” He was crrrraaazzzzy about her, I don’t know why 
I criticize him only because he was a King and an international figure badly hurting the image of Islam. Otherwise, we must avoid backbiting.
AY: To keep in the middle and profess your own opinion is true faith.
SA: You see why the Qur’an lays so much emphasis on thinking, reflection and independent analysis.
AY: I have Asad’s book on his travels through Arabia, called ‘The Road to Mecca‘, I will look the King up, see how Asad has experienced the King. Do you know the book dear Doctor?
SA: I do have the wonderful book and read it many years ago. Muhammad Asad was a great friend of the Crown Prince Faiasal, later the king.
The Grand Mufti died in 1999 at the age of 93. Only in the last year of his life did he revert to the Qur’an and, communicating with me through an old professional colleague of mine, he asked me to write THE CRIMINALS OF ISLAM. The Urdu and English editions have a brief introduction from him!
Unfortunately, his successor is reported to be a strongly sectarian N2I as well.
