Invitation to Ahmadiyyat — Page 95
95 mind will have no difficulty in pinpointing the time of the coming of the Promised Messiah as. Before we look at these signs, it is important to remember that at the time when Islam became divided into different sects, many people concocted false Traditions in support of their own sects. For instance, you will find many ‘Hadiths’ that specify the time of the coming of the Mahdi, and yet their very wording shows that they were designed to prove some argument in support of a certain sect. Even though some of these Traditions may be true, a seeker after truth must exercise great caution with regard to them. At the very least, he should not make any claims based on them. For instance, many Traditions recorded during the Abbassid era seem to speak of the Mahdi and the signs that would appear in his time, but their real purpose was to prove that the pro-Abbas - sid rebellion in Kharasan was in accord with the will of God. The inaccuracy of these Traditions was proven by subsequent events. A thousand years have passed since these Traditions were recorded and yet no Mahdi has appeared who meets those descriptions. Similarly, there are Traditions in which the signs announcing the time of the Mahdi have been mixed up with descriptions of past events. Unless the two are dis-entangled, it is impossible to discern the truth. Those who are not cognizant of Islamic history have been much misguided by such Traditions and they wait for things to happen in the future that had in fact already taken place prior to the concoction of these Traditions and had only been added to prove the truth of a particular sect. While considering the signs of the coming of the Mahdi, it is imperative that we select the signs that are not related to particular events of the past, so that we may