Claims and Teachings - Ahmad The Promised Messiah and Mahdi — Page 390
390 After this, the Holy Prophet escaped to Medina, where most men accepted him. This infuriated the Meccans still more, and they were sorry to lose their victim. Thenceforth all their efforts were concentrated on bringing about the annihilation of the Holy Prophet. The small band of Meccans who had accepted the Holy Prophet had also left their native city to seek protection in other lands and some of them had sought shelter under the King of Abyssinia. The few that remained in Mecca, being too poor to migrate, were bitterly persecuted and their cries of pain are even referred to in the Quran. The cruelties that the Meccans perpetrated on the poor Muslims exceeded all limits. They began to murder poor women and tender orphans. Some women were killed so ruthlessly that they were tied by their legs to two camels which were made to run into opposite directions and thus the poor women were torn in two pieces. When the barbarities of the inhuman infidels reached this limit, God, who at last takes pity on His people sent His word to the Holy Prophet saying that the cries of the oppressed had reached Him, that the faithful were now permitted to take up arms against the oppressors that those who had smitten the innocent with sword should perish by the sword, but that the faithful were not permitted to transgress for God did not like the transgressors. This is the truth about the Islamic Jehad, but it has been most cruelly misrepresented. God is indeed tolerant, but when the mischief of a people exceeds all limits, God does not leave the oppressors without punishment and Himself brings into existence the means of their destruction. I do not know who told our opponents that Islam was propagated by means of sword. God says in the Quran, ^ *J ) ^ * ) / 2) i. e ^