Top Five Musician Religious Conversions

Marc Israel Sellum/ Isreality.com

​The opposites of life attract us, we've always believed. Time and time again, that philosophy proves itself right. It's why in high school, the Catholic school girls were the biggest freaks.

No, that's not a myth. They were suffocated with religion or "right" and yearned for something opposite, and we saw them at the club a couple of years before we did the public-school ones.

And it works vice versa. We've been amazed how hip-hop artists can depart the world they live in, with its endless supply of delicious sin, on a dime.

We read a fascinating article last week in The New York Times about rapper Shyne finding spiritual refuge in Orthodox Judaism in Israel. You'll remember Shyne as the promising hip-hop artist of Sean "Puffy" Combs' Bad Boy Records.

He was charged with and convicted of attempted murder, assault, and reckless endangerment, and sentenced to 10 years in prison for a New York nightclub shooting. Diddy was also in attendance and cleared a gun possession charge in the same incident. It's rumored Shyne took the fall for his Combs.

No one knows for sure, but we do know this: being a "Bad Boy" will inspire you to embark on a journey to find God. Shyne wasn't the first Bad Boy artist to find religion, and may not be the last. You'll soon know what we mean.

Here's our five favorite religious transformations... and vice versa.

​Who could forget rapper Mase, P Diddy's prodigy gone religious? Not long after his solo debut Harlem World skyrocketed to No. 1 on the Billboard Pop and R&B charts and going four times platinum, Mase announced on New York's Hot 97 he was retiring from music to pursue a calling from God.

Five years later, Mase attempted a comeback with Welcome Back, which didn't do badly numbers-wise. It went gold, but Mase has never been able to replicate the success of Harlem World. God help him.

​What is it with Bad Boy musicians and their religious transformations? Do you remember Loon? Oh, you remember Loon from P.Diddy's hits like "I Need a Girl Pt. 1." Dude was fly. His self-titled debut album was released by Bad Boy, but Loon left in 2004 to start his own label, Boss Up Entertainment.

Shortly after, he converted to Islam and quit music. He's traveled to Mecca, Saudia Arabia, Islam's holiest and most sacred site, to perform Umrah and is now focusing on giving Da'wa, which could be classified as Islamic missionary work.

Check out the above video of an Al Jazeera interview with Loon where the journalist presses Amir for a freestyle rap about Islamic life. It's pretty uncomfortable. You'll find it at 3:41.