Dr. Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips was born in Jamaica, West Indies, and grew up in Canada, where he accepted Islam in 1972. He completed a B.A. from the College of Islamic Disciplines (Usool ad-Deen) at the Islamic University of Madeenah in 1979 and a M.A. in Islamic Theology in 1985 at the University of Riyadh, College of Education. In 1994, he completed a Ph.D. in Islamic Theology in the department of Islamic Studies at the University of Wales. From 1994 to 2001, Dr. Bilal founded and directed the Islamic Information Center in Dubai, United Arab Emirates and the Foreign Literature Department of Dar al Fatah Islamic Press in Sharjah, UAE. In the year 2001, Dr. Bilal established the Islamic Online University, the first accredited Islamic university on the Internet. He was a professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies at the American University in Dubai and Ajman University, head of the Department of Arabic and Islamic Studies at Preston University-Ajman, UAE, and a lecturer at Qatar Guest Center, Doha, Qatar.