Malfuzat - Volume VIII — Page 41
25 October 1905 41 product of the thoughts of the Noble Messenger, may the peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, and wrote these sto- ries down having heard them from the Christians. Therefore, to distinguish itself from all these sects, this sect was named ‘Ahmadiyya’. The Promised Messiah as was still speaking when this maulaw i again asked, ‘The Holy Quran commands: 1 اَل اْوُقَّرَفَت اَل اْوُقَّرَفَت [Be not divided]; however, you have created division. ’ The Promised Messiah as said: I do not create division; I have come to remove division. If there is disrespect in having the name Ahmadi, then there is disrespect in also being called Sh a fi‘ i or H anbal i. However, these names are given by those great people whom you also consider to be righteous. The person who objects to such peo- ple and calls them evil would be unfortunate. They gave them- selves these names only to distinguish themselves. My work is from God and whoever raises an objection against me raises an objection against God. We are Muslims, and Ahmadi is a differentiating name. How can the identification badge appear if only Muslim is used as a name? God Almighty desires to bring into being a Jam a ‘at, and distinguishing it from others is essential. Without distinguishing it, its benefits cannot be logged, and only being called a Muslim does not permit creating a distinction. The era of Imam Sh a fi‘ i and [Imam] Hanbal etc. , was also such that innovations began to take hold. If these names had not existed at that time, it would not have been possible to dis- tinguish between the righteous and the wicked. Thousands of evil men would have remained intermixed [with the righteous]. These four names were like four walls for Islam. If these people 1. S u rah A l-e-‘Imr a n, 3:104 [Publisher]