DIVINE DEATH SQUAD


- by Gulzar Anwar -


Death is sure of one who is born. It is the one reality the man always prefers not to face, forgets or skips over conveniently although he knows there is no escape from it. He sees his fellow beings dying everyday around him but refuses to take lessons to fashion his life in a decent way. He attends the funerals, says the farewell prayers for his friends and foes alike, takes a last look of the dead bodies, whom he has to follow one day, often accompanies the cortege to the cemetery, watches with remorse the rites of burial and throws the customary last "handful" of dust on the grave but is not prepared to heed and take an insight into the final end of man which is very tragic to say the least. I translate below a Persian quatrain which is a stern reminder to man to realise his real status in this world and mend his ways before the time runs out for him to avoid his frightful end:
"Come for a moment and pass through the graveyard. Cast a glance at your final destination. Thousands of beautiful faces lying under the dust. Look, cast off all the spite and disdain from your head."

But the man is intransigent, contumacious and refuses to recognise his real state which is "dust he is and unto dust he has to return" and overlooks the fact that once he transmutes from his terrestrial repose, he loses all his significance whatsoever except that he will for sure receive the recompense for his deeds strictly according to their being good or bad during his incarnate period on this earth. Inspite of this miserable end, he is busy making problems for others and is generally given to strutting out before his fellow beings and shows spite to everything which does not fall within his good will. The two inherent evils in a man i.e. corruption and greed, which are the source of all the trouble for the entire human race, accompany him right to the end and are deposited with him in the bowls of earth but even the fright of death does not impel the person to expel these evils from his body frame. The man fails to gain awareness of his self and remains a captive of his desires all his life, is generally lost in its momentary pleasures and when the death brings the curtains down on him, he is already ill-prepared to cross over to his eternal abode. Life is only an illusion and death serves to disillusion the man in regard to any misgivings he may have had about life in his mind.

It is important to always keep the efflux of time in mind, as the death sounds no alarm bells when it comes. It is inevitable and can be sudden and unexpected and is not used to giving any respite to anyone when it strikes at its appointed hour. Nevertheless, sometime it casts its shadows before when someone is terminally or very seriously ill but no one can predict its arrival time accurately. It is a gateway to the afterworld. None has been given the power to administer it to any one at will nor can any one delay or hasten its arrival. You cannot hide from it. Death is a logical end to a man’s earthly life, which is only a probation to test him, and you cannot transfer one man’s death to the other. Your deeds good or bad have nothing to do with the arrival of your appointed time. It is pre-determined and fixed and cannot be averted. Every one will take his turn on his appointed time. There is no man-made pattern for death as it is solely determined by the will of God. Scanning the history of mankind, at no place does one come across that the arrival of death was determined by any single act of man falling in the category of good or bad or any holy man was in control of delaying or hastening the death of any one. God is merciful and judicious and does not interfere with the schedule of the demise of human beings already charted out from day one. All men are born equal and there is no divine discrimination inasmuch as the final exit of man from this world is concerned. His stay here is neither prolonged nor cut short. The schedule of arrival and departure is, per se, tight and not pliable and cannot therefore be interpolated or interfered with. In other words, the arrival time of death is precise and immutable. He is Almighty God who does not personalise the arrival of death in different cases as, despite being All Powerful, He is free from any shallow thinking, prejudice or giving preferential treatment in isolated cases for altering the chart of death, even on the demand of his most favoured people, which otherwise is already clearly drawn out leaving no room for alteration at any time. They say that the final day of a human being is determined the moment he arrives in this world.

According to a time-worn Punjabi maxim, you cannot trust on death or a guest. They will arrive any time, and without notice, and you may not be ready for them. Yet, you have to welcome them with open arms whether you like it or not.

In short, life is a conundrum or a long lane which has many a turning. The behaviour of life is fulsome. The man winds down through the journey of life as a wayfarer and faces all kinds of troubles along the way until he wears himself down through the ups and downs of life. The weary body needs rest and it is here where the death proves a great leveller. It should be enough to say now that no body knows what he is going to do tomorrow and where and when he is going to die. Remember for one last time, dear readers, that the life span of a human being is pretty well planned which is always reducing, as the countdown continues, the shadows of death are lengthening with every passing day and we get a step closer to the ultimate reality of leaving this temporary abode to meet our Creator.

About death, Mirza Sahib, in his book "The Philosophy of the Teaching of Islam", while dilating on the third question, gives his valued opinion in his opening remarks before he proceeds to talk at length:
"... man ... does not come into the world of his own accord, nor will he depart therefrom of his own will.."
Surely, the Almighty Allah controls the exit and entry of man from and into this world. That should be a proof enough to vitiate the claims of anybody who professes to possess the power of invoking the death out of turn, delaying it or postponing it for any reasons, whatsoever, in any body’s case however evil he might be.

Nothwithstanding the above, my Qadiani friends have their own logic about death. They not only warn people for dying a miserable death, they summon death to punish their enemies as also quote cases where death, in the past, had arrived out of turn or immediately on people who offended their spiritual leader or the community, in general, in an oppressive or abusive way. From the internet I found people delivering death threats and intimidating others about the arrival of their death in a given period of time. How do they forecast this, and on what authority do they do so, I do not know but below I reproduce one Mr. Shahid Eithisham Mirza from USA issuing death warrants to Dr. Rashid and with considerable conviction. Read and enjoy:
"i am going to allaha tonight .therefore ,i am giving you notice the same you sent to hazoor .in eight days some hell things will happen with you,if you do not repent .i am going to allaha tonight just for you satin,.rasheed you are in a trap. nobody can help you except allaha .repent as early as possible. shahid ahtisham mirza new york "
You see he says he is going to see Allah during the quiet of night. As I say, he has chosen the night to plan his punitive action, with some divine aid as an appanage, avoiding the daylight hours when the people are dispersed all over the place, lest some body spots him going heavenwards. He is not nocturnal though, only the bats are! Where is the meeting place with God fixed, he does not say anything about it despite knowing full well that God has no study set aside to receive people? This is only the beginning of the real threat. He is simply setting up his target (Dr. Rashid) for the final and fatal blow. I have reproduced the above exactly as it was and have neither altered even a comma nor changed the lower or upper cases. How do you find it? Does it make any sense to you?. Look the way he is treating the Almighty Allah. Nothing more than an intimate/trusted friend next door who can be visited and called upon any time to come out and destroy a naughty person who has been misbehaving lately and causing ripples in the peace and quiet of the community people. Look the way the threat is being taken to its logical conclusion. He is relentless and says again:
"if nothing happened to you in 8 days i will assume that there is no true religion on the earth.in both case you will get punishment .therefore,ready for it. may be in next few days your whole life will be in hell inshalla.you will know what i mean very soon ."
Please watch out carefully the tenor of threat being delivered gradually, the quality of language being used and the punctuation applied.Any boy in Pakistan at the high school level will do a better job when writing something to someone. If the threat does not take its toll, the poor religion has to be the ultimate sufferer as if the Almighty does not exterminate the troublesome person the religion loses its licit standing in the estimation of Mr. Eihtisham. That is typical Qadiani logic in my opinion which few people, like me, will understand.

You are not done with yet, an astonishing piece of considerable daring and pluck is still to follow:
"if i admite that Mirza sahib is liar then same time i will believe that all prophets are liar,there will we no more prophethood in the universe ... "
To me the above appears to be the outcome of a disturbed mind and when someone goes to the extent of saying that if such and such person is a liar then the whole company of prophets gone by are liars too, you have hardly a chance to give him a piece of wise counsel but you can certainly give him a peace of mind if you want to.

Only the Almighty Allah can help him. By even the simplest psycho-analysis, such a person will deserve all my sympathies. Let us proceed to see what he says next:
".......i am coming with you punishment with the army of Allaha.now you can not run .your time is over .it is end of the thread which was loosen by Allah.......... "
See the garbage he makes out from the words he uses and the sentences he constructs for invoking divine help to destroy someone he is at variance with. Talking about the army of Allah and the punishment hardly makes any sense to any one with a sane mind. He is coming with a bagful of punishment and is asking his adversary to show courage and stay there to face the awesome punishment he is bringing along. Not content with the above, he proceeds further:
"... it is a life and death game .i am not a religious person but my allaha is coming to give my reply.wait for him... "
See the way Allah has been reduced to a commodity under the exclusive use of these people. Where is Allah coming, he fails to cite exactly? So, you see the threat was delivered in pieces and consummated with the final warning that Allah is on the way to arrive any moment and will take it upon Himself to deliver the final blow. He is not the first person to talk balderdash. This is their stock in trade. A no-nonsense guy will hardly brook such a nonsense but Dr. Rashid must be a remarkably patient person who has quietly taken these body blows without delivering anything in return. I think these people are mentally sick and need help. Show some compassion to them instead of getting cross.

Now if you read Mr. Shahid Eitisham Mirza’s letters carefully, you will see the kind of ordinary grammatical mistakes he makes. I was flabbergasted to read the low level of his skill for letter-writing despite living in USA where he was expected to know a lot more of the English language, at least the colloquial English if not the literary side of it. His knowledge of English is not only poor but, apart from poor grammar, his ken for proper spelling is sadly missing. He did not realise that if his grammar was not correct and spellings good, how will God understand his request when he was going to be in direct communication with Him face to face? When someone does not understand your speech - because either it is faltering, impaired, obscure or cryptic - he finds it unwieldy to talk to you and prefers to dismiss you at once. Allah is Himself beautiful and loves all things of beauty. So, you have to sound beautiful in your speech too before being admitted for audience by Him.

For a change, in the context of death, a few quotations from the Holy Book:
  1. Everything that is thereon will pass away.
  2. Every soul must taste of death.
  3. Wheresoever ye may be, death will find you out, even though ye are in towers built up strong and high.
To sum up, everything animate or inanimate passes through its different stages of development and will reach its end, which is the appointed time of its terminus, again through the will of God and not because of any other reason of any possible perception. So, when the death arrives there is nothing much you can do and arrival of death, according to scriptures, is the reality of life one must not forget, it is merciless and it makes no discrimination for high or low, good or bad and adheres strictly to its time schedule. But it is all in the hands of God and no human being can envision its arrival. The attempts made by prominent persons like Mirza Sahib in foretelling the death time of some of his enemies also failed for example in the case of valetudinarian Abdullah Atham, Sanaullah Amritsari, Dr. Abdul Hakim Khan, etc. Inspite of this, the literature of Qadianis is replete with incidents where they claim people having died because of hurting the Jamaat or incurring its displeasure, in one way or the other, which was a fitting reprisal by the Providence on behalf of the people so humble and innocuous.

Life may not be bed of roses but it can be made a full cup of joy, although a full cup always needs a steady hand otherwise it is bound to spill over. Death on the other hand offers nothing of the sort as it shuts the doors of this world on a man once he transits into the afterlife.

Moulvi Mohammad Hussain Batalvi is quoted to have died miserably and his family having suffered a disgraceful end except for his grandson who is said to have escaped the punishment by entering the fold of Jamaat. Pray, tell me even if Batalvi was punished by the Almighty for offending Mirza Sahib, what was the fault of his family? Can the punishment for an offence committed by father be passed on to the son? What divine justice? It requires some explanation at least to satisfy a mind like me which does not reconcile to such crazy ideas. Suppose what happened to Maulana Batalvi was true, why did it not come true in the case of Abdullah Atham, Dr. Abdul Hakim Khan and Sanaullah Amritsari and why these avowed enemies of Mirza Sahib got away without any punishment? True that what is good for the goose may not necessarily be good for the gander but what is good for one goose must, at least, be good for all the geese. So, if Batalvi had to suffer as a consequence of slighting Mirza Sahib, Atham, Hakim and Amritsari should never have been spared and instead driven to go over the precipice.

The way the Qadianis present their case vis-a-vis the deaths of their enemies, I can make out only one conclusion now and that is that a Divine Death Squad has been outfitted which is on constant patrol, watching the people carefully and any time someone is found causing problems to my Qadiani friends, this Divine Death Squad quickly moves in, immediately intervenes and the man planning to inflict any harm to them or having some damage done already will instantly pass on to the other side of the fence without getting a chance to atone for his sins.

Here is another case of Pundit Lekh Ram who is also said to have died because of the imprecation of Mirza Sahib and as presaged by him. Now, if you look into the mysterious circumstances in which Lekh Ram died, this will give you plenty of food for thought and you will not fail to arrive at the conclusion that the eventful death of Lekh Ram made the whole case dubious, especially, when the killer was never apprehended.

In such a case you cannot say for sure whether the whole thing was planned or intended or happened without any extraneous help or better still it was out and out adventitious. Only the sleuths of extraordinary ability and experience can prove it. But, in this case, a sinful man died converting another innocent person sinful who was made to commit a murder only to fulfil a prophecy. However, if the killer of Lekh Ram was one of the members of the Divine Death Squad then it would certainly make some sense to me or to any one else for that matter.In another way, had the God decided to take Lekh Ram’s life, as a routine, the death could have come through cardiac arrest or simple asphyxiation or some other similar causes which are much more easily believable than through the knife of a murderer in order to later avoid demystifying the death clouded in mystery.

The episode of Lekh Ram begins when on April 12, 1893, Mirza Sahib proclaimed through a handbill that he saw a fearsome looking man in a vision who looked like an angel. Remember readers that an angel is always presented as a model of innocence, like angelic looks etc., whereas in the vision to Mirza Sahib he appears as an awesome person or, more exactly, as a demon. It cannot be phased in words to establish what an angel exactly looks like but, as far as I have been told, an angel is an intermediary between God and His prophets, is a bodiless spirit and is not visible to human eyes. According to our Holy Book:
"If thou couldst see when the angels take the souls of the unbelievers (at death) (how) they smite their faces and their backs (saying). Taste the penalty of the blazing fire. "
Now, many people must have seen unbelievers dying before their eyes but never seen the punishment being inflicted on their backs and faces by the angels. Angels are a metaphysical being and cannot be seen. So, as a human being, you are not supposed to see them, much less see the punishment they inflict. However, the angel asked Mirza Sahib about the address of Lekh Ram and another enemy of his. Mirza Sahib immediately assumed that he (angel) had been commissioned to inflict punishment on Lekh Ram and the other person. Pray tell me, does it stand to reason that an angel sent to do a job directly by the All-Knowing God should need to ask for the address of his victim from Mirza Sahib or any other mortal in the same token? On such an important mission the angel is coming inadequately briefed, and therefore wholly unprepared, to locate the whereabouts of his quarry. Suppose, by then, Lekh Ram had left his home to go somewhere, how the Angel would have tracked him down? There can be a legitimate poser here that since it was an angel of doom, it had to look ugly and frightening. The answer is that the angels and demons are two different creatures and have no sameness in their appearance. The angels are, however, reported in the scriptures to have come in human form only to some prophets. Therefore, Lekh Ram was not supposed to see the angel whether he was ugly or good looking. Lekh Ram was only a polytheist and a victim and, therefore, not expected to see the angel in any form when he arrived to take his life. Strange, my Qadianis friends rejoice over such ridiculous stories.

The date for the death of Abdullah Atham was set for September 5, 1894. A day earlier some incantation was done on grams which were thrown in a deserted well and those given this assignment were asked not to look back after completing the task and return with all haste. This was done to doubly make sure that Atham died as anticipated but he survived and was duly taken out in a procession by Christians through the Amritsar streets. Where was the Divine Death Squad then? May be holidaying somewhere on a beach to let Atham hold up the prophesy for sheer joy because he needed a boost for his failing health.

While addressing Maulana Sanaullah Amritsari, Mirza Sahib said: "If I am a liar I shall die in your life time because a liar always dies in the life time of his worst enemies" and later-on Mirza Sahib confirmed unequivocally that "these words were not his but from God". What happened eventually was that Mirza Sahib, on the contrary, died in May, 1908 and Sanaullah Sahib lived until well after the formation of Pakistan. Again we see the Divine Death Squad hamstrung, in some way, and sparing Maulana Amritsari for no good reasons.

Dr. Abdul Hakim Khan of Patiala was an inveterate enemy of Mirza Sahib. He proclaimed that Mirza Sahib will die before August 4, 1908 and to retaliate Mirza Sahib counter-forecast his death. The result was that Mirza Sahib died on August 4, 1908 and Dr. Abdul Hakim Khan lived longer after that. The activities of the Divine Death Squad are again not visible here as it looks they were loathsome to react in time.

Also, there are other cases which are cited by Qadianis like those of Saadullah Ludhkianvi who is said to have died without posterity, Chiragh Din Jamooni who was mowed down by plague and Dr. Dowie of USA who was incapacitated by paralysis and later passed away. Although, these incidents can be easily discussed like dying, without children, has directly to do with sterility problem either in husband or wife or both and dying by paralysis is a kind of some biological malfunction in a human body and both these cases constitute questions of medical science while death through plague directly results out of a calamity which strikes people, without distinction, and is beyond anybody’s control. Still, inspite of these good reasons, I do not think it will serve any useful purpose to go into the details of these cases. Whichever way my Qadiani friends prefer to feel, it would suit me fine and I would rather like not to dispute. Even if you agree to concede that these cases were a genuine fallout of Mirza Sahib’s malediction or hex, the fact remains that the Divine Death Squad is very selective in the choice of its victims in that it leaves out those who are more prominent like Atham, Amritsari and Dr. Abdul Hakim Khan but clubs down the unknown quantities like those named in the beginning of this paragraph.

The cases, cited in the above and following paragraphs, can be read on their website in Urdu, available in an easy-to-read book form, by just clicking. The comments and translation are mine and I stand to be corrected in regard to any mistake that I might have made. I have discussed frankly with no prejudice nor do I intend to hurt anyone. Yet, if anyone feels that I was offensive, rude or hostile in any way, whatsoever, I sincerely apologise him. I hope I have clarified my position on the subject.

Many relatives of Mirza Sahib, who were agnates or otherwise and refused to accept the claims of Mirza Sahib, are said to have died with no offspring except a boy from among them who survived because he became a follower of Mirza Sahib and had children. Suddenly the Divine Death Squad intervenes here again to destroy relatives of Mirza Sahib sparing only a boy. So much for the love of Mirza Sahib for his kinfolk. Jesus spent his entire life gathering the lost sheep of Israel, living in continence and pursuing this task alone, while Mirza Sahib, against the spirit of his proto type, is seen busy decimating his own close and distant relatives who did not agree with him and one of them had the affront of even refusing outrightly to give the hand of his daughter in marriage to Mirza Sahib despite some passionate appeals and animated efforts made by Mirza Sahib himself to enlist the support of some notable persons from within the family and overtures and threats made to those of the girl’s elders who could possibly influence her father to relent and agree. Even the threats, coercion and blackmail failed to work. After all hopes were lost to win the hand of the girl, Mirza Sahib decided to fall back on his prescient skills in order to prognosticate as follows:
About the husband of Mohammadi Begum, Mirza Sahib said:
"……… if I am a liar, my prophesy will not come true and my death will arrive
The position is that not only Mohammadi Begum survived to live until late after Mirza Sahib died, her husband also lived for much later, despite injuring himself in the WW-II, to make a mockery of the forecast. Pray tell me, where the Divine Death Squad could have been? The unfortunate corollary, however, of the forecast was that Mirza Sahib carried out the threat, already made, and divorced his wife and his son also, under duress, divorced his. Timely intervention of the Divine Death Squad could have averted this disaster and the two innocent ladies saved from being driven to a life of privation, which a widow faces, for no fault of theirs. Despite, a humming female side of the house, Mirza Sahib decided to add to the distaff portion under divine direction. Remember, a prophet never speaks until he is asked to. In support of my claim I translate below a Persian verse:
"Mustafa (PBUH) never spoke until Gabriel spoke (to him). Gabriel never spoke until God spoke (to him)."
In short, what is decided in heavens must come to pass. But, in this case, we see it happened to the contrary. Mirza Sahib could not have possibly spoken against the will of God but why the will of Almighty failed to materialise is difficult to answer. As I have said above, Jesus went celibate all his life but should all the messiahs, or at least the replica of Jesus, then live a life of celibacy? I cannot answer this question. Prophets are special people of God but for ordinary people like me, I can say, a house without a woman is a haunted house and that is why the houris will be there to keep you company in the paradise. However, although allowed to have more than one wife, I cannot understand why a man should need a second wife unless there are fertility problems or he has a nagging wife? In the later case, I quote the Solomen’s wisdom:
"A nagging wife is like a water going drip-drip-drip on a rainy day. How can you keep her quiet? Have you ever tried to stop the wind or even tried to hold a handful of oil?
The above will surely give a strong justification, in addition to cases of sterility, to have a second wife in the presence of the first one.

I have seen, in many cases, where a man has a wife and children and is happy yet he seeks to marry a second time. Why? There can be no other reason except carnal pleasures but that can be open to debate. Remember, I am talking about ordinary people falling in my category while special people of God do not say or desire anything until they are directed to do so.

A low-key case which I have read in the book - biography of Mirza Tahir Ahmad Sahib - is the death of Ashiq Hussain, a Goldsmith of Shahkot in Dist. Sheikhupura via electrocution which has been claimed to have happened only because the person was organising a demonstration against Qadianis. I reproduce below the relevant portion from the book pointing to the incident (translation is mine):
"The pamphlets of Mubahila reached Shahkot. This is a small town of District Sheikhupura in Pakistan.………. Ashiq Hussain, a Goldsmith by profession ……………… organised a big procession against …………. Ashiq Hussain went into the shop ………… as soon as he tried to switch on the fan he was daily using …………. received an electric shock, fell down and died ……….. (Ek Mard-e-Khuda-Page 379)
Obviously, one of the members of the Divine Death Squad short-circuited the power supply to the shop to have the scamp despatched to the world of dead. The readers should note that this ferment was a direct result of the “Mubahila” pamphlet. If we honestly try to apportion the blame, the writer and distributor of the handbill were directly responsible for the flare-up. This is, however, a sad story. The point to remember is that in the said demonstration the deceased was not the only one who participated. There must have been other men and/or women as is usually the case when such a demonstration takes place as a reaction or chain reaction to something extraordinarily provocative. How the other hundreds of participants escaped a similar end through some bizarre happening definitely deserves explanation? This is yet another case which has been made up by my Qadiani friends to prove the probity of their faith and what is most remarkable about it is that it is mentioned in the biography of their current Imam. I do not think there is any lack of learned people in the Jamaat which boasts of having plenty of learned men (erudite), in its ranks, who can shed some light on such a logic which otherwise makes little impact on most people. Yet, how do they accept such funny stories is not readily understood but they just hold fast to the official policy line of propagating make-believe stories like this and they are received with considerable enthusiasm and readiness? Strange, the people who talk so much, and ask, about the logic in regard to the return of Jesus with his terrestrial body hardly bother about questioning the validity of such wild claims where people are quoted to have died because of hurting the Jamaat or its people. To avoid any explanation, they will do well by attributing these acts of murder to the Divine Death Squad employed for this purpose.

In a closely similar incident, another enemy of Qadianis, living in UK, accepted the challenge of prayer duel (mubahila) but soon afterwards he died in a road accident and when people came to his house in order to offer prayers, the roof of the house caved in over their heads and many people were injured (ibid Page 380). The man who died paid for his mistake, alright but what about those who were injured following the roof falling over them? Did they commit a sin by offering sympathies to the bereaved family? Now this mubahila stuff is becoming overly complicated as the time wears on. There have been claims and counter claims accusing each other for running away from the battle royal. When it is going to be resolved no body knows. I understand that Mirza Tahir Ahmad Sahib threw the gauntlets to the mainstream Muslims for a mubahila. Obviously, he did this after some careful consideration and this evoked considerable interest and a flurry of response, although with some commotion, as every other day someone came out to accept the challenge but the mubahila remains elusive so far as it has not been held nor any steps have been taken to hold one as yet. Madness prevails but the method to madness is missing. May be, there are some finer points to be sorted out. When is it going to happen, only God knows? Mirza Tahir Ahmad Sahib refuses to come out of his hermitage/fastness in London and the controversy continues regarding the form of Mubahila, how and where it should be held? I think Mirza Tahir Ahmad Sahib should give up dictating terms of Mubahila and compromise on a given and take so that the people of the 20th century witness a novel way of establishing the veracity of a faith, simultaneously reliving the scenario of 14 centuries ago. I do not, however, think they will ever agree and I fear the people might get disgusted with the whole thing and the very word “mubahila” may, at some point in time, become deseutude. Who to blame?

There is, however, an easy solution in that I will recommend that my Qadiani friends summon their Divine Death Squad, pervading the heavens and earth, to go roving about and wherever they see someone clamouring for mubahila should be dispatched to hell. That is the only way out, unfortunately though!

Lord Nelson, the British Admiral, who exhumed the body of Mehdi Sudani, and desecrated it, died a violent death and his body was entomed in the deep recesses of water when his ship sank. That could be the most glaring example of someone dying, outside of his appointed time, for offending a pious freedom fighter who had every right to wage a holy war against oppressors and liberate his people. I would still prefer to believe that Nelson died on his appointed time, and because of the force majeure on which no one has any command or control by any worldly means, and yet his excesses against Sudan and its most respected leader had nothing to do with the way he died. However, this is solely my opinion and is not binding on others and everyone is free to differ. The greatness of great people like Mehdi Sudani lies in the efforts and sacrifices they make for their people, and example they set for their future generations, and it is for this that they will ever be remembered and not because some of their enemies died an exemplary death to pay for their misdeeds or excesses. Who cares if an idiot lives or dies! For this illustrious band of people, Dr. Iqbal had said:
"They set up a good tradition by commingling themselves in the dust and blood. May the God Almighty shower his (choicest) blessings on these ingenuously loving people of a pious disposition."
The man, they say, occupied a lofty estate of living in the Eden garden although he had as humble an origin as can be perceived for being created from clay. The clay or soil is as low as the belly of snake and every body knows what “belly of snake” means figuratively. Yet, the Almighty Allah assigned him a most high position where he never knew even the meanings of vice and virtue. Unfortunately, he had a sudden fall from grace through eating that forbidden fruit and was evicted to live on earth and strive for his living. From then on the cycle of life and death began. The duration of this cycle is determined by the Almighty himself and therefore He warned all men to beware not to take the life of a fellow being as, otherwise, it will tantamount to killing the entire human race. Death is a difficult experience but life is no easy either. In a way, death is a blessing as it provides a relief and brings an end to a man’s miseries which, as a human being, he should carry as a burden all his life but that, most certainly, does not mean you have to die before you die to rid yourself of the inexorable experience of life. You have to wait for your time to come and until then you are required to live it out one way or the other. Ghalib correctly pointed out: “Why should a man be free from the worries (of life) before his death”. After crossing the threshold of death the man, once discarnate, is said to be happy over feeling himself free from his bodily confinement the same way a bird is happy to free itself from the coop but that this is beyond our perception. In this context, I translate a couple of Persian verses:
"Do you remember you were weeping when you were born and everybody else was smiling? Similarly, when you will die everybody will be weeping and you will be smiling."
The good and bad deeds of a man are subject to divine justice and no one can pronounce a judgement, on this account, in this life. Even if a man kills another man, he has to be tried under the proper state law and no one can take the law into his own hands and kill him to pay for his crime. The killer can even escape punishment from the court, through a smart and garrulous attorney, but on the final day of judgement he will have to stand in the dock, on this account, before the Supreme Judge to account for his wanton behaviour against a fellow being who had equal rights to enjoy all the joys of earthly life. In the same token, any one who offends a holy man will eventually pay for his arrogance by undergoing the divine justice and will not die for his brutal behaviour alone in this world. Cessation of life in this world may be for any biological reasons but the end of life, in itself, is not programmed by any human hand, so the forecast of death of an individual by an individual is very difficult. If someone is too daring and does take a plunge to foretell, he should give the biological reasons or point to a precursor for the upcoming death in a certain case that is in which way the death will arrive whether it will be through a certain clearly defined biological phenomenon or whether it will be through the gun or the knife of a killer. Only then it will add a semblance of credibility to such a premonition. Despite as simple a truth as this, my Qadiani friends insist that they have a Divine Death Squad employed to take the lives of those who ill- treat them and cause them problems either mentally or physically. If that is their logic, they are free to believe so but the Divine Death Squad will be well advised to keep the distance and not to interfere in the exclusive domain of God Almighty and leave it to God to exercise His rights to give and take the life. To conclude, I do not think Allah delegates His supreme powers to award life or death to any man however pious and closer to exclusive divine favours he may be.

Epilogue:

Mirza Sahib claimed to be incarnate, 2nd advent and replica of the Prophet of Islam (PBUH), Jesus Christ (PBUH) and even Krishna at the same time. Both the messengers of Allah were full of compassion and mercy for the mankind. They never anathematised any one of their fellow beings for personal reasons. They were maltreated, abused and tortured, yet they wished every body well. Never made any forecast nor issued any ex cathedra death penalties about any one whereas, on the contrary, we see Mirza Sahib invoking death for just about every body who dared oppose him.

As for Krishna, I shall quote him:
"Desire and disgust are the products of nature. No man should live in the shadow of either - they are deadly enemies."
You see, how clear is Krishna about warning man to beware for nursing a desire and fostering a disgust in one’s heart, about any one, because these are his deadly enemies. An ordinary person cannot rise above his ordinary level but the messiahs and prophets never sweat over small things like who says what about them in an insulting or invidious way. They have to look ahead to complete their mission and not to look back to care about the yapping curs. A caravan always passes and dogs keep barking even until the dust settles down on them. We have to see, now, if the replica lived to the words of his proto type? Unfortunately, we find that he was himself overcome by the passionate desire of winning the hand of Mohammadi Begum in the first case and, in the second case, carried considerable disgust inside for all those who dared not to agree with him and very often foreboding them to die and fixing definite time limits within which they will fall.

The above will lead you to ask one question and that is: Should not a replica, incarnate and the 2nd advent be an exact copy of the proto type? Must not have the same attributes? How is it possible that a replica be any different in character and temperament, in fact, exactly the opposite of its original? In daily life, I invite you to place a sheet of printed paper on the glass of a copier, feed a plain white paper, press the button and what you will see coming out from the other end will be a facsimile of exactly the same character and attributes. It is just not possible for replica to be even a wee bit different from the proto type in any possible way. Here, we see in contrast the replica sending signals of death and destruction for people whereas his proto types were all love, compassion and mercy even for their enemies. Whose credo it was:
"Love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you …. Why should God reward you if you love only the people who love you?
To win over, you have to work on the hearts of people than expending your time and energy by working on their mind. If you work too hard on a mind, it might rebel. After all, don’t they say in Persian:
"Winning over a heart is as good as performing a Haj-e-Akbar.”
These things are not a part of any curriculum to be taught in the lyceums alone, you have to follow them in your daily life so that the people accept you as a guide.

Similarly, why should a girl, for example, or her husband for that matter, be punished with death if her parents refuse to give her hand in marriage to a holy man? What is her fault, after all, the final decision lies with her parents? Suppose she dies, according to the prophesy, on the day of judgement she might ask the Almighty “What was the sin I was killed for?”. What do you guess will be the divine answer? It is yet another case of Zaid dying for the sin of Bakar or, more precisely, the daughter dying for the sin of an uncompromising father. These are simple questions but very important to answer and cannot be simply swept under the carpet.

All the trials and tribulations which the family of prophet underwent in Karbela, Mirza Sahib claimed to have undergone every moment of his life. Let me quote Edward Gibbon here about the tragedy of Karbela:
"In a distant age and climate, the tragic scene of the death of Hussain will awaken the sympathy of the coldest reader."
Comparisons are odious but look the way the comparison is being made here. Can a man of even average intelligence agree to listen to these things, let alone believing in them? Mirza Sahib had a smooth sailing as far as the records show. No harm came upon him nor to any one else from his family. No body was killed, nor even stones were ever thrown on any one of them and, above all, Mirza Sahib died a peaceful death and very well taken care of right to the end. The family went from rags to riches, thanks to the royal favours. The full protection of the Government of Her Imperial Majesty, Mirza Sahib remained so busy praising all his life, was available at all time. Pages over pages were written to eulogise the British rule so much so that it was claimed with considerable pride that those pages were enough to fill 5 full sized cupboards. The family still enjoys, even after 100 years, the fruits of this labour. Compare this to the gruesome details of the unfortunate events that took place in Karbela. They transfixed even a 6 months old child.

Also, why to have complaints against the people revolting? Messiahs are always expected to have tough time, especially, against clergy. Their main task is that of a redeemer, no matter people listen to them or not. They have to stick to their task under all circumstances and if they start encountering every opponent on personal basis they will be distracted from their line of duty. The arrival of messiah is futuristic because it is going to restore the future world to order and not the world which has gone by and this belief is held by most of the world religions with varying emphasis. But one thing is common in all of them and that is that the messiah will restore order to the troubled world or humanity. Like a true messiah, you have to be very patient. All the messiahs and reformers are, without exception, ahead of time. The message or reforms they bring are not easily understood by the people of their age. It takes a generation or two to understand the importance of these messages. So, why to lose your cool and start calling the Divine Death Squad to snuff out the lives of those who do not agree or dare to differ, criticise and lambaste or even ridicule, especially, when the pretending messiah has a mystical robe and is refuting the bloody nature of such a messiah? Why to issue death warrants then if the people are not willing to receive you or listen to you. That is against the spirit of a messiah. Messiah should just pass on the message and leave it to the people to either grasp it or floor it because it will be they who will be answerable for this in the end. The Almighty has all the means available to take care of the people who are not only insolent but revile those whom He has sent with a special message.

Even the message of Jesus was not accepted straightaway by his people and the Government of the time acceded to the demand of the clergy to crucify him. Yet, after a generation or two later, when the people understood the message underlying the gospels, the entire Roman Empire surrendered before the spiritual onslaught of the Christian missionaries. But, in his life time, Jesus never intimidated or threatened any of his enemies with dire consequences when they continued vilifying and annoying the person of Jesus himself because he knew the people will not immediately understand neither him nor his message. He did what he was commissioned to do and left the rest to the will of God. His patience paid off and the formidable Roman Empire was, eventually, on his feet a generation or two later.

Moral
: A true messiah never gives a false impression and a pseudo-messiah is not equal to the task and that to divine the future course of events is not all that important.

To wind up the discussion on the work of Divine Death Squad, may I quote two important incidents from history involving John the Baptist and the person of Jesus himself. In the case of John, he was killed by Herod the Roman Governor of Galilee at the behest of his wife. The story is that Herod had married the wife of his brother and John rebuked him because this was against the law of the time. Herod had met John before and was impressed by him and knew that he was a prophet of the Israelites and highly respected. His wife was not kindly disposed towards John and wanted to take a revenge because of his criticism on her unlawful marriage. She persuaded her husband to kill John but the later won’t agree. On a feast which Herod gave, as an annual event, in honour of the state officials and the Chief Priests of the Jews, his daughter danced to please the guests. Herod was pleased with her and asked her to ask for a gift of her choice which he took a vow that he will give her. The daughter went in to consult her mother, Herodias, who found it an opportune time to take the revenge and get even with John. She advised her daughter to ask for the head of John. The daughter faithfully obeyed her mother and asked Herod to give the head of John as a gift he had promised her. Herod was caught in a spin as he did not want to kill John but could not go back on the promise he had made to her daughter. So, finally he had John beheaded and presented the head to his daughter in a silver platter to redeem the pledge he had made to her. It was a gruesome murder, yet no harm came either upon the tetrarch, his wife or his daughter and they all lived on until their appointed time. The worst case scenario is that of Jesus himself. Following the conspiracy of Jewish priests, the Roman governor of Jerusalem, Pilate ordered to have Jesus crucified despite knowing that he was an innocent person and despite washing his hands off before the crowd saying “I am not responsible for the death of this man. This is your doing”. Yet he was responsible for agreeing with the request of the Jewish clergy to have Jesus crucified. This was a political decision to oblige the clergy so that there were no riots to endanger the peace. Inspite of such a revolting infraction by the Government and the clergy, nothing happened to either the Pilate or the Jewish priesthood and they also lived on until their appointed time. May be there was no Divine Death Squad at work in that age. I would ask readers to compare these cases with the cases often quoted by my Qadiani friends to vindicate their point that those who offend their community die a miserable death. I don’t regard anyone from their community to favourably stand even remotely in comparison to the position of either Jesus or John, much less to become their equals.

In the end, I would request the readers to ponder over the above details and examples the Qadiani community takes so much pride in and use their own judgement in regard to the Divine Death Squad at work, its legitimacy, its achievements and its failures. I would like to leave it at that before it becomes too ponderous.

November 2000



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