Malfuzat – Volume I — Page 2
2 1895 Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Respected Mufti Muhammad Sadiq Sahiba writes: 'Even in 1895 when I would visit the Promised Messiah (as), in my eagerness, I would record his holy words on a piece of paper and take them to Lahore where I would read them out to Ahmadi friends in our weekly meetings. I present here some of my recollections from that time to readers. In those days, since exact dates were not recorded, I put forth all of these words undated. ' The Oath of Allegiance and Repentance One should understand the benefit and need of swearing an oath of allegiance to a spiritual guide. Until the benefit and worth of a thing is known, its value cannot be appreciated. For example, a person possesses diverse forms of wealth and prop- erty around their home, comprised of rupees, paise, cowries, and firewood, etc. Everything is safeguarded according to the degree of its worth. A person would not tend to the safekeeping of a cowrie as carefully as one is compelled to look after a paisa or rupee; firewood and the like is usually left lying around in the corner of one's home. In the same manner, a person is more protective of that which inflicts more harm if lost. Likewise, the outstanding aspect of swearing allegiance to a spiritual guide is repentance (tawbah), which means to turn back (ruju). Repentance refers to the state when man forsakes the ties that bind him to sin. When a person is indulged in a life of sin, he begins to dwell in this state and sin becomes his homeland, as it were. So, tawbah is to leave one's homeland and ruju means to purify oneself. It lies heavy on a person to leave their homeland and one is faced with thousands of difficulties in doing so. There are a myriad of problems that one is confronted with even when he leaves his home. But when it comes to migrating from one's native land, an individual must sever ties with friends and loved ones, and bid farewell to everything, such as his hearth and home, his neighbours, the streets and alleys of his prior homeland, and its place of business. He is compelled to move to a new country and he never returns to his homeland. This is called tawbah. The friends of evil are different from those who befriend righteousness. The Sufis have named this transformation 'death. ' A person who repents is compelled to sustain a heavy loss. Indeed, true repentance demands great sacrifices, but Allah the Exalted is Merciful and Munificent. God does not let a person die until He bestows upon them a better substitute for all