The Heavenly Sign — Page 20
20 understand from the Hadith: لا مهدى الا عيسى 20 Nishan-e-Asmānī quoted by Ibni Māja and Hākam, that only he can attain the perfect status of Mahdias who has first become ‘Īsāas. This means that when a person becomes so perfect in devotion to Allah, that he become a pure soul, only then does he become 'Rūhullah' in the sight of Allah and is known in heaven by the name of ‘Īsās. God Almighty bestows upon him a spiritual birth, which is purely by His Grace and not through a corporeal father. To be so completely free from all kinds of darkness of the corporeal self, as to become soul incorporeal, is the consummation of self-purification and self-annihilation for the sake of Allah. This is the state of 'Iswiyyat which Allah bestows to perfection upon whomever He pleases. And the highest stage of Dajjaliyyat, according to: أَخْلَدَ إِلَى الْأَرْضِ " is that a person becomes progressively more and more inclined towards mundane desires till he falls into the abyss of darkness and becomes darkness itself. He acquires a natural amity with darkness and an innate antagonism to light. The existence of Dajjāliyyat, as opposed to 'Iswiyyat, is imperative, because opposites can only be recognized by contrast. These opposites have 20 Mahdi is none other than 'Īsāas. [Translator] 21. . . he inclined to the earth. . . Al-Aʻrāf, 7:177 [Translator]