Rushdie Haunted by his unholy Ghosts — Page 31
31 C H A P T E R F I V E : T H E A PPE A R A NC E OF T H E R E F OR M E R OF T H E AGE Islam was certainly at an all-time-low. It was high time for the Reformer of the Age to appear and to make the claim to be the protector of the Faith and to restore Islam to its original purity and pristine quality ! This would fulfil yet another prophecy of the Holy Prophet(sa) of Islam. It was the plan of the Almighty that in the same way that Muhammad(sa) appeared amongst the people living in the darkest period of the Dark Ages, that of the period of Jahliyya (period of ignorance) when mankind was almost entirely bereft of spiritual light, so in the same way the Reformer of the Age would appear amongst the people who had all but obliterated the name of Islam from the face of the earth. And in the same way that Muhammad(sa) was ‘the man of the hour’, so similarly was the Reformer equipped to defend the faith of Islam. The Reformer of the Age, Hadhrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad(as), who made the claim to be the Promised Messiah and Mahdi that everyone had been waiting for, was the founder of the Ahmadiyya Movement in Islam. He defended Islam to the hilt using cogent, effective and convincing arguments to prove its truth ; and he com- pletely vindicated the name of Muhammad(sa) from the insults and the tarnished and tainted image portrayed of his noble character that was purity personified. The Promised Messiah(as) also did something that none of the other Muslims had been able to do and that was to rock the very foundation that Christianity was based on - the concept of Trinity; he literally broke the Cross and this was all done under the very noses of the British, the self-proclaimed defenders of the Christian faith.