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Books
Section
> Ahmadiyyat
in the Service of Islam by Naseer Ahmad Faruqui
Sahib
> The Greatest Dangers to the World of
Islam Chapter
7: The Holy Quran and the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) had both forewarned that towards the end of the long history of the world, certain mortal dangers to Islam and the Muslims would arise. Let us take up the Holy Quran first. It is well-known that when the Holy Prophet appeared, the seat of opposition to him, but really to Islam, was the town of Makkah. As it was the temporal leader of Arabia, so it became the leader of religious persecution, hostility and war on Islam and the Muslims. The Holy Quran, the Great Word of the Almighty Allah, said: 'And it is forbidden to the town, which we shall destroy, that they shall not return. Until when Gog and Magog are let loose and they will sally forth from every position of vantage' (21: 95-96). The word qaryah (town) is used here in the singular to denote greatness, prominence, uniqueness. Makkah has been called, in another place in the Holy Quran, the 'Mother of Towns,' because it was the place where Adam and Eve lived, Adam building the first house for the remembrance of Allah at Makkah ('Verily the first house of Allah built for mankind was at Makkah' - Holy Quran 3:95), and Eve being buried at Jeddah (which word literally means the 'grandmother' - of nations, of course). What the Holy Quran says in the verses quoted above is that the opposition to Islam and the Muslims (which was represented by Makkah) will be destroyed. It will not return until Gog and Magog (then held in invisible chains of Divine destiny as the Holy Prophet saw in a vision about them) will be let loose, and they will sally forth from every position of vantage. Gog and
Magog: How Gog and Magog (the Western Christian nations) will revive dangerous hostility to Islam and the Muslims is prophesied later on in Chapter 61 of the Holy Quran, where, after it is stated that Jesus Christ made a categorical prophecy about the advent of the Holy Prophet of Islam, it is added that when the latter came to be known to the Christians, (a) They called the clear arguments of the Holy Prophet a fraud. The commentators of the Holy Quran had agreed long before the Promised Messiah appeared in the person of Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Sahib that the above-mentioned wonderful service to Islam would be performed by the Promised Messiah. The Holy Quran not only confirms it but says that he will form a Jama‘at to be 'his helpers in the way of Allah,' by stating a few verses later: 'O you who believe, be the helpers of Allah, as Isa son of Mary said to his disciples, Who will be my helpers in the way of Allah?' (61:14). In trying to understand this verse, the following facts may be borne in mind: (i) That all prophets had called upon their people to be their 'helpers in the way of Allah.' Those who responded to him, and did not falter, are the Lahore Ahmadiyya Jama‘at. How well the Promised Messiah, single-handed, confronted the might, myriads, money and missionary zeal of the Christian nations attacking Islam will be shown in the next chapter. Here, we must continue with the theme of this chapter as to the identity of Gog, Magog and Dajjal. Before we turn to the Hadith, let us have a look at the Bible to see what it says about the identity of Gog and Magog: 'And the word of the Lord came unto me saying, Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the Chief Prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him: And say, Thus saith the Lord God, I am against thee, O Gog, the Chief Prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal: and I will turn thee back and put hooks into thy jaws' (Ezekiel 38:1-4). This interesting reference shows that: (a) 'Gog' is the Russians (Rosh). Meshech (Moskoa) and Tubal are rivers in Russia, on the former of which is situated the Russian capital Moscow. It would be of interest here to quote Sir Winston Churchill, the world-famous Prime Minister of Great Britain and a historian of note. He was making a speech at the London Lord Mayor's banquet at the Guild Hall on Friday, 9 November 1951, on the occasion of the restoration of the effigies of Gog and Magog at the entrance to the Guild Hall. In the course of his speech, Sir Winston Churchill said: 'It seems that they (Gog and Magog) represent none too badly the present state of world politics. World politics, like the history of Gog and Magog, are very confused and much disputed. Still I think there is room for both of them. On the one side is Gog and on the other is Magog. But be careful, my Lord Mayor, when you put them back, to keep them from colliding with each other, for if that happens, both Gog and Magog would be smashed to pieces, and we should all have to begin all over again-and begin from the bottom of the pit' (The Times, London, 10 November 1951). If that was the world's most outstanding statesman and historian, the most outstanding Muslim poet and philosopher of the sub-continent (now India and Pakistan), Dr. Sir Muhammad Iqbal, wrote about the present-day alignment of the Big Powers an Urdu couplet, which is translated as under: 'The forces of Gog and Magog have all become evident. Let the eye of the Muslim see the explanation of the verse of the Holy Quran.' Dajjal
(Anti-Christ): Hundreds of thousands of Muslims fell for this deception. No wonder that the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) called the Christians Dajjal, which means the deceiver or the liar in matters of religion. He has also called them the Masih-ud-Dajjal because they lied about Jesus Christ that he was the Son of God, etc., or because they preached about him as the Messiah, as the Saviour of the world, while what they sought was the perpetuation of the world-domination of the Christian powers. Whatever the explanation, the Christian all-out attack on the world of Islam was the gravest danger in its history. How correct the Holy Prophet of Islam was in describing the perilous situation of the world of Islam in the following words: 'From the creation of Adam to the Day of Resurrection there would be no greater danger than the Dajjal' (Mishkat, Chapter on Dajjal). This warning hadith, with slight variation of words, occurs again and again. And the danger was so grave that the Holy Prophet taught the Muslims a prayer to be said in the Muslim prayers five times a day which says: 'O Allah! I seek refuge in Thee from the trial of Masih-ud-Dajjall.' That this grave danger would arise from the twin aspect of the Christian onslaught against the world of Islam is very evident from the Holy Prophet's advice to the Muslims that to save themselves from this grave danger they should recite the first ten verses of the Surah al-Kahf (Chapter 'The Cave') of the Holy Quran, which expose the falsehood of the doctrine of the Sonship of God, and the last ten verses of the same surah which speak of the false glamour of the scientific and technological achievements of the Christians and their engrossment in the material life of this world, which will bring down Divine retribution on them. Apart from this clear indication of the identity of the Dajjal, there are hundreds of other prophetic sayings of the great Prophet of Islam indicating the characteristics of the Dajjal, only some of which are reproduced below for the sake of brevity. (1) 'Behold, he (Dajjal) is blind of one eye (specified in another hadith as the right eye) and between his two eyes is written kafir' (Bukhari, 93:27). A breathtakingly true picture of the world-domination of the Christian powers in the nineteenth century of the Christian era! We have had perforce to quote a number of the prophetic sayings of the Holy Prophet of Islam, not only to show what an amazing foresight of future events he was given by Allah, but also to make clear the identity of Gog, Magog and the Dajjal. Although the signs he gave are amazingly clear, yet, because the language of prophecy speaks in metaphors and people unfortunately take them literally, the universal impression among the Muslim ‘ulama and other Muslims was that Gog and Magog were some unimportant nations whose mention in the Holy Quran was only incidental, and that the Dajjal would be some strange creature, physically blind of one eye, with the word kafir literally inscribed on his forehead, riding an amazingly huge ass whose two legs will cover the span of the earth, and possessing superhuman powers. The first man to identify them as the Christian powers and their missionaries was Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Sahib. This is a fact of history and record which cannot be denied (see his book Izala-e-Auham and other writings and speeches). And when he wrote about it people scoffed and ridiculed him and the idea. But in course of time they came to believe in the identity of Gog, Magog and Dajjal as spotted and proclaimed by Hazrat Mirza Sahib. It must be said now that the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) had also prophesied: 'A person from among the believers would say, I will go up to this man (the Dajjal) and see whether or not he is the person against whom the Prophet of Allah had issued a warning. That person will then shout, This is the Dajjal of whom the Prophet of Allah had spokenÉ That man will be greatest as a witness in the eyes of the Lord of the Worlds' (Mishkat, Kitab-ul-Fitn, page 474). That that person will be the Promised Messiah was also prophesied by the Great Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him). When Hazrat Umar ibn Khattab, thinking that one Ibn Sayyad was the Dajjal, sought the Holy Prophet's permission to kill him, the Holy Prophet said, 'If this is the Dajjal foretold, then you have nothing to do with him, as the Son of Mary is his master' (Mishkat, Chapter on Ibn Sayyad). How the Promised Messiah dealt with the grave danger to Islam from the Dajjal and virtually finished him off will be discussed in the next chapter and Chapters 11 and 12. Anti-Christ: Books
Section
> Ahmadiyyat
in the Service of Islam by Naseer Ahmad Faruqui
Sahib
> The Greatest Dangers to the World of
Islam
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