Truthfulness of the Promised Messiah: X – Signs of the Latter Days
This last Criterion is concerning the signs of the Latter Days. It is not really concerning anyone else, only the Promised Messiah and Mahdi who is expected during this time. The Holy Qur’an states in relation to this:
Soon shall we attend to you, O ye two big groups!
Which, then, of the favours of your Lord will you twain deny?
O company of Jinn and Men! If you have power to go beyond the confines of the heavens and the earth, then do go. But you cannot go save with authority.
Which, then, of the favours of your Lord will you twain deny?
There shall be sent against you a flame of fire and smoke; And you shall not be able to help yourselves. Holy Qur’an, Chapter 55, verses 32-36
The Holy Bible states:
“And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars; see ye be not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there shall be famines, and pestilences and earthquakes in divers places.” Holy Bible, Matthew Chapter 24, verse 6
Here, we see ‘A flame of fire and smoke’ and ‘For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom’ refers to World Wars. Additionally, ‘And there shall be famines, and pestilences and earthquakes in divers places.’ refers to these things happening all over the world. Of course there have always been wars, famines, pestilences and earthquakes, but now with the invention of the printing press and television, we get to hear about these much more easier and swifter. So we are hearing constantly about the Tsunamis, Aids and famines in Africa etc.
The Holy Qur’an also mentions about Ya’juj and Ma’juj or Gog and Magog in the Holy Bible, that these two would make their appearance in the Latter Days. These two great powers seemed to represent ‘the Soviet Union’ and ‘the West’. Both came into great ascendancy in the last Century. The Soviet Union or Communism, teaches atheism, whilst ‘the West’ teaches materialism. Both these teachings pull mankind away from God. Hence the battle between the Second Coming of the Messiah and Gog and Magog. God has brought communism to an almost end and whilst materialism is still going strong, if we look towards the great Western Countries of America and the Europe, externally they seem strong, but internally their moral decline is slowly destroying these countries. Hence, the only answer for these two great powers is to turn to God through the acceptance of the second coming of the Messiah.
There is also in the Bible the mention of the Anti-Christ or Dajjal in the Islamic teachings. The Anti-Christ means that it is against God. Now both of the great religions depict this battle in the Latter Days between the Anti-Christ, the Dajjal and the Second Coming of the Messiah. They both depict that this power struggle will be between Christianity and Anti-Christianity, therefore, we can understand it to mean that it will happen at the time when Christianity will be a powerful and dominating force. Now it is interesting to note that the Holy Prophet Muhammad, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, instructed his followers to turn to the first ten verses of Surah Kahf (Chapter 18 of the Holy Qur’an) when they confront the menace of the Dajjal. The first ten verses of this chapter contain a refutation of Christianity. For instance, one of the verses relates “And that it may warn those who say. Allah has taken unto Himself a son”. This seems to indicate that the Holy Prophet warned the Muslims that the Dajjal was Christianity, whose teaching are against God (that God has a son, etc).
Of course, the general understanding is that the Anti-Christ or Dajjal will be some kind of powerful individual, a kind of superman with great powers or the Devil raised for the final battle of mankind! But if we examine some of the sayings of the Holy Prophet then we can come to a different understanding, one more realistic. For instance, the definition of ‘Dajjal’ must be understood in classical (fus’ha) Arabic. The word ‘Dajjal’ is derived from the root word ‘dajala’ meaning to deceive, cover up, or lie to conceal truth. Dajjal therefore means ‘the Great Deceiver’. One thing must be understood that the classical dictionaries of Arabic lexicon reveal that the Dajjal is a group of people and not one person. For example, the Taj al-Urus states:
“The Dajjal is the name of a large party which through force of numbers, will spread over the whole earth, and according to some authorities, it is the name of a party which keeps moving from one part of the world to another the goods and material in which it trades”.
These descriptions apply to Christian propagandists today. They transport their books from one part of the world to another, promoting business activities wherever they go. It is true that the Dajjal has other signs. He was to be one-eyed and was to have with him a donkey of inordinate size. Clouds of smoke were to be seen in front of the animal and behind it. These descriptions are symbolic and indicate that the Dajjal will be a group of men devoid of spiritual vision and that the donkey of the Dajjalsymbolises the railway and modern transport, inventions made in Christian countries. When the steam train whistles, the sound resembles the braying of a donkey. It uses fire and water as fuel and clouds of smoke are before it and behind it. Christian propagandists use it for transporting themselves to different parts of the world.
Therefore, we understand that with the second coming of the Messiah, he will remove the false teachings of Christianity and instead bring the true teachings of God. This will be the battle between the Anti-Christ or Dajjal and the Second Coming of the Messiah.
So these days have been prophesied in the Holy Qur’an and Holy Bible and were prophesied by our beloved Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, but it also means that they also prophesied about the coming of the Promised Messiah and Mahdiwho should come to fight the Dajjal (Anti-Christ – the battle between good and evil).
Look around you, and you see everywhere you look, mankind is moving away for Allah. Even in the Muslim world, most Muslims do not truly believe in a Living, Powerful God and do not follow the beautiful teachings of Islam, as Allah wants us to. They may proclaim that they are and that they truly believe in Allah, but materialism has taken hold of them. Money has become their God and instead of running after the pleasure of Allah; they are running after the pleasure of the world.
But Allah has not neglected Muslims in these troubled times, instead, as He promised, He sent the Promised Messiah and Mahdi to help bring mankind back to God.
Now one should be asking, ‘if the Mahdi has come, how come people do not know about it?’ ‘Why is Islam still in such a state?’ But the problem is the same problem that has been since the beginning of man. Whenever a prophet comes, the people are far away from God and do not want to accept the prophet. Hence they turn against the prophet. Why did the Quraish turn against the Holy Prophet? Why did the Jewish leaders turn against Jesus? It was not because of the person – they were Godly people. It wasn’t because of the message – the message was from God. So then why? It was because they spoke out against the leaders, what they were doing, what they were practising. The leaders did not want to lose power and position, so as they were in the majority, they turned against the prophets. It has always happened, so why should it change now?
Can you imagine that if Jesus did come from the skies or the Imam Mahdi appeared today, as is expected by other Muslims, how would they react if they saw the state of the Muslim World? The Holy Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, told us that he would leave us with two things and if we followed them we would never go astray – his Book (the Holy Qur’an) and his Sunnah (practice and sayings). Alhamdulillah, we still have the same Holy Qur’an today as was sent to our beloved master and we still have his Sunnah – therefore we should not be astray? And yet we see that the Muslim World is not united. Our beloved Holy Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, has said “Abuse of a Muslim is sin and his murder is disbelief” (Bukhari & Muslims) and yet Muslims are fighting Muslims, killing Muslims, abusing Muslims, calling Muslims Kafirs. Is this Islam?
So what will Jesus or the Mahdi do? Will they pat the Muslim leaders on the back and say ‘well done’ you have done a wonderful job of dividing Islam! – or will he blame the Muslim leaders, that why are they not guiding Muslims properly? Obviously, they will blame the Muslim leaders.
So what will the Muslim leaders then do? Will they accept that they are in the wrong? Or will they turn against Jesus or theMahdi like the Quraish turned against the Holy Prophet or the Jewish leaders turned against Jesus and try to kill them!
Sadly the same pattern happened when Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, may peace be upon him, claimed that he was the Promised Messiah and Mahdi. Instead of accepting him (the Muslim world would then unite and following the true teachings of Islam once again) they chose to turn against him and prevent Muslims from accepting him by calling him, God forbid, false, a Kafir(disbeliever) etc.
But as the Holy Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, was saved by Allah and became victorious; as Jesus, may peace be upon him, was saved by Allah and continued to spread his message to the ‘other sheep’ (the Jewish tribes that had been scattered all over the East) to accept the coming of the Holy Prophet; so too was Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, may peace be upon him, saved by Allah and his community is now continuing his work to make Islam victorious and bring back the true teachings of Islam. No doubt it is going slowly, as the Muslims Ulema are still trying to hinder the work, but this community has Allah’s support behind it, so it will never fail.
We are constantly fighting the Dajjal – Anti-Christ – those things moving mankind, against God. It is the only answer for Muslims and Mankind. Either they turn to God, accept the Promised Messiah and Mahdi and strive to please God or there will be a third world war. But this time it will, most probably, be a nuclear war and there will be few survivors and the material things will be destroyed and man (the survivors) will once again turn to God, Insha’Allah. Pray that they see the truth and turn to God and accept his servant for this time.
