Scattered Pearls — Page 17
16. On onother occasion the Promised Messiah was sitting in a room, and he had some people with him, to whom he was talking, when someone knocked at the door from outside, whereat one man, out of the small audience, rose to open the door. But the moment the Promised. Messiah noticed this movement, he rose quickly himself, saying to the man: "No, no; please sit down. I will open the door myself. You are my guest at the moment, and the Holy Prophet has said that guests should be shown due respect. ” (Seeratul Mahdee). Now both these incidents are apparently very small and unimportant. But for that very reason they all the more graphically illustrate the minutest care which the. Promised Messiah always took in never overlooking any preference shown by the Holy Prophet on any occasion, for anything whatsoever. Incidents like these show that with the Promised Messiah his desire to obey the commands. and observe the preferences of the Holy Prophet was like a natural spring in the hills, which continues to flow uninterrupted all through the night and the day, maintaining a spontaneous flow, irrespective of what went on around. 8. The life which the Promised Messiah lived was entirely free of the element of show, and of all kinds of pretence. Our maternal uncle, Hazrat Meer Muhammad Ismail, lived in the company of the Promised Messiah for a full 27 year. He had a remarkably intelligent and observant mind; and he often used to say to me that during his life he had come in contact with innumerable people-worldly people, as well. as those who claimed to be, or were taken to be, far from worldly. But that in all his experience, he said, he had never seen a man more free of the element of pretence (takulluf) in his life than was the Promised Messiah in this respect. And exactly the same is mine own impression