Life of the Promised Messiah — Page 78
78 Give me swift news of your full recovery. Sincerely, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Qadian 24 October 1899 Gratitude is due to God. By the prayer of His Holiness as I regained my health. As such, from among the circle of our noble friends, not a single one would disagree when I say that His Holiness as holds the hand of each and every one of us, and this is always the case. His Holiness as may read out before a gathering an exposition that he has written or the text of an announcement. Often he reads out his work to his dev- otees before sending it to print and if anyone critiques the work or raises something, this very much pleases His Holiness as. And in this quality, I have found His Holiness as to be unmatched. A Muslim cleric or world- ly writer becomes enraged if anyone criticises them, and they consider themselves to be immune to error. 7 7 There is something remarkable of the relationship between His Holiness as and his devotees. On one occasion, he said: “It is my belief that any individual who makes a vow of friendship with me even once, I have such regard for this vow, that irrespective of their nature and no matter what they become, I cannot sever my ties with them. If the individual cuts off their ties with me themselves, in that case I am helpless. Otherwise, my belief is that if one of my friends had collapsed in the market after consuming alcohol and there was a crowd of people around him, I would pick him up and take him away without fear of reproach by any critic. ” Then, he said: “The