Flowers for the Women Wearing Veils - Volume II — Page 7
7 Address to Lajna Ima’illah Karachi Delivered by Hazrat Mirza Bashir - ud - D in Mahmud Ahmad, Khalifat - ul - Masih II ra Karachi March 18, 1948 Profound Relationship b etween C onviction a nd Action God Almighty has created human nature in such a way t hat i t tends to pay more attention to t h ose things which are certain. As conviction increases, one’s deeds progress , and as one’s conviction lessens, one’s actions also regress ; except in the case of those people who are lazy and negligent in their work. For otherwise, c onviction is such a thing which is deeply tied to action. No one deliberately takes a vial of poison, no one knowingly pokes his hand into a snake’s nest , and no one intentionally walks into a lion’s den. No one deliberately falls off the top of a tall building. People who commit suicide are exception s , for they wish for their own death. Aside from them, people do not intentionally undertake anything which would result in their death ; i f it occurs by accident , th en that is another matter. For example, some people sleep on a roof which has no walls; the result is that while sleeping at night they accidentally fall off the ro of and are killed. In villages, Muslims usually sleep on such roofs even though the Holy Prophet sa has very clearly forbidden sleeping on a roof which has no walls. However, because this guidance is disregarded , at times when people wake during the night for something or other, and they wish to go downstairs, instead of walking in the direction o f the stairs, they walk to wards the opposite side. Thinking they are descending the stairs , they take a step , fall to the ground, and at times die in the process. H owever , this happens by accident and is not a deliberate action. In the same way, sometimes a person unknowingly eats food which has been poisoned by an enemy and di es. This too is not delibera te [on the part of the person who consumes the poison] and is a mistake. Anyhow, if a person has knowledge that something is harmful for him, he wi ll not commit such a mistake. We see this occurrence so often within human life that it can be