Malfuzat – Volume III — Page 200
200 Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad now wishes to manifest the pure and radiant countenance of Islam. As such, this community which He has established with His own hand makes it clearly evident that now the era of divine succour has dawned, and the days of Islam’s honour and glory have arrived. For the help and support which stands by my side is not enjoyed by the follower of any other Faith. I confidently proclaim, is there anyone from any faith who can manifest heavenly signs which support the truth of their own religion aside from Islam? God Almighty has established this community in view of His promise to preserve the teachings of Islam as follows: 1 َ لَهٗ لَحٰـفِظُوْن الذِّكْرَ وَ اِنَّا نَحْنُ نَزَّلْنَا اِنَّا Verily, We Ourself have sent down this Exhortation, and most surely We will be its Guardian. My objective was to explain that a Martyr (Shaheed) does not refer solely to one who fights a non-Muslim in war and dies. It is this definition which has defamed Islam; and even now, we observe that often the foolish Muslims of the frontier region fancy it a means of spiritual reward to kill innocent Englishmen. We hear of such incidents every other day. Some days ago, a person belonging to the fron- tier region murdered a English lady in Lahore. These asinine people fail to realise that this has nothing to do with martyrdom; this is the murder of an innocent soul. Islam does not wish to create disorder and conflict; in fact, the very word Islam demands peace and harmony. If those who raise allegations with reference to the Islamic wars had stopped to observe the sorts of injunctions that were given when these wars presented themselves, they would be astonished. Muslims would not kill women and children, or the old, and those who paid the jizyah would be released. These wars were based on principles of defence. In my view, those ignorant Pashtuns who attack innocent British people and murder them, do not attain the status of martyrdom in the least; in fact, they are murderers, and so they ought to be dealt with as murderers. So what it truly means to be a Martyr is that when a believer reaches this sta- tion, Allah the Exalted grants them a special kind of steadfastness. Such a one is prepared to bear any misfortune and hardship in the way of Allah Almighty with pleasure. As such, the class known as Martyrs is also from among the group referred to as ‘those upon whom God has bestowed His blessings’, as alluded to in the following: 1 al-Hijr, 15:10 p. 182