Qadyani against Muhammad(pbuh)

Qadyani tirades against Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) and his Companions

To cap all their other profanities, Mirza as well as some of his followers and admirers, had been guilty in their various writings and pronouncements of gross and brazen disrespect towards the august personality of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) himself and those of his companions. To cite a couple of examples, one Hakim Muhammad Hussain Qadyani, who was also a relative of Mirza, mentioned in his book Al Mahdi that a distinguished member of Mirza’s household had once observed to him that the prophecies of the “promised messiah” (i.e., Mirza) far out numbered those of even the Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) himself. He further had the audacity to say that the righteous Caliphs Abubakar (R.A) and Umar (R.A), were not fit even to untie the shoelace of Mirza Sahib!  (Na’uz-u-Billah) 

Reaction of the Muslim Ummah to Mirza’s claim

The claims and assertions of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Qadyani as explained earlier intended to strike at the very roots of the Muslim belief structure in many vital spheres: interpretations of the Quran and Hadith; wahi (divine revelation); jihad (holy war); raising alive of Jesus Christ to heaven by God and his predicted future descent to earth; and above all Mirza’s blatant violation of the concept of finality of the prophet-hood of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) which is the cornerstone of the edifice of Muslim belief. What was more, Mirza’s character, life-style, social dealings, the vulgar and intemperate languages used by him in reference to some of the most eminent an respected Muslim personalities, his volte-faces concerning many of his claims and pronouncements the absurdity of those claims, and similar other factors all these helped preclude his being accepted even as an honourable ordinary person, what to speak of being considered worthy of the high station of prophet-hood.

Contrary to unanimous Muslim beliefs based on the Quran and the Sunnah, Mirza had declared, inter alia, that: (a) the door to wahi (divine revelation) was permanently open, and that on that basis he himself was an apostle of Allah; (b) only his own interpretations of the Holy Book were the correct ones, and all others were wrong; (c) God had given him the choice to accept or reject whatever he wished out of the current collection of the Prophet’s ahadith; and (d) anyone who did not pledge allegiance to him was outside the pale of Islam.

For all these reasons, the Muslims naturally found it impossible to accept Mirza’s ludicrous claim to prophet-hood. Since Mirza’s claims had started initially in a low key, and had gradually become more and more daring, it took the students and scholars of religion some time before they could grasp the real gravity of the threat which Mirza’s writings, pronouncements, and doings posed to the solidarity of the Islamic Ummah. Inevitably, however, the time came when Muslim ulama and intellectuals were compelled to take serious notice of the activities of this 19th / 20th century impostor, and to launch a unanimous crusade against his heretical creed. Through sustained writings and speeches, they exposed the sinister designs underlying the Qadyani movement with such force and vigour as to render it largely ineffective.

Hazrat Pir Meher Ali Shah (R.A) was in the vanguard of this combined struggle of the ulama of India against Qadianism. He was indeed amongst the first to grasp its real evil motives, publicly denounce those motives, and warn other Muslims against them.  

The Qadyani and Lahori factions

Following this sentencing of two Qadianis to death in Kabul (Afghanistan) on grounds of apostasy (which is an offense punishable by death in an Islamic state), the Qadianis desisted for a long time from visiting Islamic countries for the preaching of their creed. Qadyani (or Ahmadi as they prefer to call themselves) missionaries are now working in some European and African countries, but in doing so they present themselves to the people of those countries as orthodox Muslims and followers of the Holy Prophet (P.B.U.H) of Islam. In its own homeland, the Ahmadiya have split into two factions: The Qadianis and the Lahoris. The former factions believes Mirza to be a full-fledged prophet with a shariah of his own, and regards anyone not believing him to be a prophet as a kafir (infidel). The latter, however, considers Mirza to be the Mujaddid-e-Azam (the Great Reviver of Religion) only, or at best a zilli nabi (shadow prophet), and regards anyone rejecting him as a sinner but not an infidel.

These two factions have engaged in hot debate on their respective points of view from time to time. Here are two examples:

1.      Verse 81 of Surah 3 (Al-e-Imran), quoted below speaks of a covenant made by Allah with the earlier prophets to believe in and extent their support to a prophet who was to come at a later date and was to re-affirm what they themselves had brought to mankind:

“When Allah made (His) covenant with the Prophets (He said): Behold that which I have given you of the scripture and knowledge. And afterwards their will come unto you a messenger confirming that which ye possess. Ye shall believe in him and ye shall help him. He said: Do ye agree, and will ye take up My burden (which I lay upon you) in this (matter)? They answered: We agree. He said: Then bear ye witness. I will be a witness with you.    (III, 81)

The Qadianis interpret the foregoing verse as referring, not to Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) as unanimously believed by the Muslim Ummah, but to Mirza Ghulam Ahmad. The Lahoris however, totally reject this distorted interpretation.

2. The Qadianis have tended to gloss over the many inconsistencies in Mirza’s ever-changing interpretations of prophethood to suit his own ends. They have, in fact, lent unquestioning credence to those interpretations, and have allowed themselves to be misguided by them. The Lahoris, on the other hand, have not only exposed the inconsistencies but have even mocked at the brain which produced them.    (Cf., Al-Fazl, official Qadyani newspaper, dated 26 February 1924, and Paigham-e-Sulh, official organ of the Lahoris, dated 27 April 1934 and 3 May 1934).

Analysis of factors responsible for Mirza’s blundering into misguidance

The most important lesson to be learnt from Mirza’s “tale of woe” is that anyone who wishes to traverse the thorny and uphill path of religion and spiritualism must do so under the guidance of an accomplished teacher and a guide. Failure to do so is apt to land the seeker into pitfalls of superstitious, delusions and misgivings etc., from which it would be well-nigh impossible for him to extricate himself. Maulana Jalaluddin Rumi (R.A) has forcefully underscored this point in the following verse of his Mathnavi:   

Translation:  “Seek a Pir (spiritual guide) (for thyself), because without a Pir this (spiritual) journey is full of hardships, fear and hazards”.

Mirza Sahib has stated at various places in his writings that he had not linked himself with any spiritual school, that he had no “spiritual father”, and that God Himself was his sole spiritual teacher and guide. He also regards this as a sign of his resemblance to Jesus Christ, and of the blessing of God. He does not, however, realize that what he considers to be a source of divine benediction for him is in fact the real tragedy of his life. He also fails to recognize the basic truth that in this world which is governed by the interplay of cause and effect in every sphere, be it secular or spiritual, every art and craft has to be learnt from a skilled teacher. Without such guidance, aspirants to spiritual accomplishment remain ever vulnerable to self-delusion, which could lead them to make claims of prophet-hood in the same manner as Bab and Baha-ullah did in Iran and Mirza Ghulam Ahmad in India in the recent past. What is even worse, these ill-fated personalities were responsible not only for their own spiritual damnation, but also for misguiding large number of simple-minded and ignorant people who readily succumbed to their seemingly ”revolutionary” calls in a spirit of hero-worship. In the case of Mirza, for example, those who rallied round him as his devotees and followers took no notice whatsoever of his palpably sacrilegious and heretical “ilhamat” (inspirations). They completely ignored Mirza’s claim, inter alia, that his God had called him His son, thus violating the Quranic assertion in Surah Al-Ikhlas (“God begetteth not nor was He begotten”), or that he had claimed to be Muhammad and Ahmad, thereby refuting the Quranic pronouncement that Muhammad (P.B.U.H) was the last of the Prophets (cf. XXXIII, 40).