Friday Sermon of
Hazrat Amirul Momeneen
Zafrullah Domun

28 NOVEMBER 2008

At Bait-ul-Rahma Mosque
Les Guibies, Pailles
MAURITUS

After reciting, Tashahhud , Ta'uz and chapter Al Fatiha of the Holy Quran, Hazrat Amirul Mo'menine Zafrullah Domun said:

Members of the Jamaat are aware that recently we published and circulated in Creole language a blue booklet of about 56 pages. Besides four of my recent Friday Sermons I also included the translations of the two open letters that I sent to the caliph Hazrat Mirza Masroor about his international message of 27th May 2008.

As you are all aware the caliph has been unable to respond with any type of explanations because there are no plausible ones. As you may recall, I said that the caliph had attributed words to Allah that Allah never said to Hazrat Masih Maood as . As you are well aware if a recipient of revelation attributes to Allah words that Allah does not tell him he is liable to very severe punishment. Allah says in the Holy Quran:

“And if he had forged and attributed any sayings to US,

We would, surely, have seized him by the right hand,

And then, surely, We would have cut his life-vein,

And not one of you could have held Our punishment off from him.”(69:45-48)

But the caliph has told his people around the world that Allah said to Hazrat Masih Maood as that he will establish khilafat (as understood by the Jamaat) after him and we all know that this is not at all supported by any fact. Therefore this is a piece of falsehood and since it is not being corrected it means that Jamaat Ahmadiyya wants to present falsehood and make it appear as truth. Who have been guilty of such crimes according to the Holy Quran? Allah says:

And, surely, among them is a party who twist their tongues while reciting the Book that you may think it to be part of the Book, while it is not part of the Book. And they say, 'It is from Allah;' while it is not from Allah; and they utter a lie against Allah while they know. (3:79)

“There were some among the Jews who pervert words from their proper places……. (4:47)

“See how they forge a lie against Allah! And sufficient is that as a manifest sin.”(4:51)

It is an attitude of the Jews to act like this. This cannot come from the Jamaat of he who was sent with wisdom to teach Muslims what they had forgotten. Hazrat Masih gave us the purest of teachings so that we should never go astray. When we read his writings we understand that his Jamaat did not have any immunity from being corrupted. And here, of course I am referring to what he said in his book “Victory of Islam”. According to him Jamaats like human beings start showing signs of weakness when they are about eighty years old. If you want to read the whole extract, you may read my declaration on our website. If you want to read the book you may read it at www.alislam.org . At several places in his writings Hazrat Masih Maood has said that Allah has taught us Sura Fateha so that we should not become neither like the Jews nor like the Christians in our attitude. But these days unfortunately a caliph who says he represents Hazrat Masih Maood as , but yet he does seem to care at all about his statements. He has said something wrong and he does not care to correct it. Therefore you can easily understand where he is leading this Jamaat. The main distinction that Hazrat Masih has told us about the qualification of a caliph is that he is a lover of truth.

"When we read the life of Hazrat Masih Maood (as) we see that he was a personification of truth. Once I told you about the the incident about the stamp. Today I will tell you about another incident.During the hearing of the lawsuit that was filed by Christian missionary Dr. Martyn Clark, Hudhoor (AS) set a shining example of telling the truth no matter what happens. Ahmadi children should always keep this incident in mind.

Hudhoor had retained a non-Ahmadi lawyer Maulvi Fazal Din to defend him in the lawsuit. On one occasion he suggested to Hudhoor (AS) to submit an affidavit to the court that was not based on facts. When Hudhoor (AS) was asked to go over the statement, he said “the statement is not factual, I am not willing to give any statement that contains a shred of lie”.

The lawyer said to Hudhoor (AS): “if you are not willing to give such a statement, then you are asking for trouble. You have been charged with murder, in order to get rid of this charge, you must give such a statement”. Hudhoor (AS) replied back:

“I will not give a statement which is contrary to the facts. In order to save my neck, why should I earn God's displeasure? I do not put my trust in such false statements, I trust God Almighty. I am quite certain that He will protect me. “(Al-Hakam 14th November 1934)

The lawyer afterwards stated that he was flabbergasted at Hudoor's courage. Amazingly he did not want to tell a lie even though he was facing a murder charge. The plaintiff was a Christian, the judge was a Christian and all the Christians, Hindus and Muslims had joined hands in this case. They tried their best to have him sentenced by the court, but he did not knuckle under. He refused to sign the false statement. The fact of the matter is that God Almighty gave him honorable discharge because of his truthfulness.”( www.alislam.org )

Hence we see that Hazrat Masih was a paragon of truthfulness and as his followers it is our duty to follow him and to stick to what is true. It is when we start to cut corners with the truth that eventually we vitiate our own beliefs and eventually our actions. Remember that in his speech on becoming caliph Hazrat Abu Bakr Siddique said “Listen , truth is honesty and untruth is dishonesty.”

Now I will tell you about a fable. It is used in universities to help students understand some good lessons. I hope you will too. I do not remember the name of the person that has written it. However it is neither from Aesop nor from La Fontaine. There is so much to say about it that even a book has been written collecting reflections upon it.

Once upon a time a great caliph decided to have a new palace built. He summoned his ten architects and told them: Within a month I must see your plans. The grand vizier will disclose to you what the conditions are that must be satisfied and what requirements are to be met.

After a month had elapsed ten plans were presented to the caliph.

“Are all these plans identical?” he asked.

“They are all different” he was told.

“Are these plans compatible with each other?” he inquired

“They are irreconcilable” was the response

“Is one of them inspired by the true art of building?” he wanted to know

“My plan is the only true plan” the architects responded in unison.

The great caliph smiled and decided “I will choose the one which best suits my desires”

On hearing the caliph speak a venerable counselor shook his head and uttered: “who then will defend the truth if the caliph does not?”

Disturbed at this observation the caliph summoned his philosopher to ask him: “was I right or was I wrong to rely on my own judgment?”

“Did you, o great caliph have other more reasonable ways to decide?”

“No” was the caliph's response.

“Does the plan you choose still suits you?” the philosopher wanted to know.

“Yes, more than any other” retorted the caliph.

“Would there have been any advantage in letting the dice decide” said the man whose mission was to think in terms nobody else did.

“Are you jesting?” the caliph burst out

Be assured grand sovereign there is to my knowledge no reason why the caliph should not have good judgment….

“But truth -what about truth” the caliph insisted once more.

“I do not know” the philosopher said with emphasis “who is more foolish: he who lets the dice roll or he who reaches his conclusion by virtue of a truth he cannot recognize.”

The reason why I am telling you about this fable is because of the sentence “ who then will defend the truth if the caliph does not?”

Now if you cast a glance at the Jamaat in Mauritius , how much truth is spoken by the Ahmadis? How much is spoken by the amir? How much is spoken in Majlis amila? How much truth is spoken between husband and wives? Ahmadis themselves are in a better position to answer these questions.We know that at many levels untruth prevails and yet they call themselves good Ahmadis. As far as I am concerned I have always tried to speak the truth and to think good of others that they speak the truth to me. Unfortunately in some circumstances, I have to admit that many close ones have betrayed this trust. They used my virtue to betray me. But Allah has always saved me from the harm that they intended for me.

I have learnt from reliable sources that the local amir spoke about me in his speech of last week at a function in Dar-us- Salaam . It is not my intention to start a polemic with him or any other of my adversaries in the Friday sermon. Had the amir enough courage, he would have sent me a copy of his speech or he would have posted it on the net so that I might have read it and understood his point of view and I could have given him an appropriate reply. But instead, as is his wont he cracked some jokes to make people laugh and forget about the real issues. As usual he uses his position to calumniate those who are absent and make the people laugh. He has told the people not to read the booklet that we have written and if they have any question to come to him. But can a blind man lead those who are blind? In other words he wants to ban the book. When we thumb through the pages of history we see that those who ban the spread of ideas are defeated in the end. Most prominent among these have been the catholic church, obscurantist Muslim regimes, traditionalist Al Ahzar University, Hitler's Germany, Communist China and Russia when it was the USSR to name but a few. Now Jamaat Ahmadiyya Mauritius has joined the list. But nowadays this will not work. The internet has come to provide freedom to minorities who want to air their ideas around the world. Now the world has changed and what worked before will not work now. Change is inevitable. Slowly but surely all the members of the Jamaat will come to know that the true Khilafat is not what the propagandists of the Jamaat are saying. It may take time but incha Allah they will understand.

Hazrat Masih came to teach us to confront the ideas of others by expounding the beauties of Islam. He wrote indefatigably in defense of Islam. Besides, he said that it is the duty of the imam to refute all the objections that are made against Islam Those who are aware of his writings know quite well that we cannot understand the Messiah's concept of khilafat by repeating on end that it is “ qudrat sania ”. Those who say so have read only “The Will” and they think that it is the be-all and end all of the whole matter. They are thoroughly unaware of what he has said in his other books. I say it with full conviction that we cannot speak about the Messiah's concept of khilafat without understanding what he has said in “ Shahadatoul Qur'an ” which can be translated as “Evidences from the Holy Quran” This is a book of about 112 pages, but it is strange that the Jamaat has not translated it yet even after 100 years of khilafat. If we say that the present generation of scholars of the Jamaat is not aware of the book, it would be a big lie because they are supposed to know. Now if we say that they know and they have not translated it, most probably because what the Messiah says over there goes against the point of view that the Jamaat defends. For those who may be interested I suggest that you download the book from the website of our Ahmadis brothers of Lahore Anjuman Ishaat Islam at www.aaiil.org/text/books/mga/testimonyholyquran/testimonyofho and read and enlighten yourself with the teachings of the Promised Messiah as he has presented it to us. Although I do not entirely agree with our brothers of Lahore in all matters of doctrine, yet their contribution to the spread of the ideas of Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad as cannot be ignored or underestimated. They have rendered more of Hazrat Masih's books in English than the mainstream Jamaat which has far more resources. I believe that we can disagree without being disagreeable.

It stands to reason that anyone who says that he comes from Allah, he should love truth and stay far away from falsehood. If this is difficult for those who say that they are from Allah, just imagine what will be the situation of their followers. If you say you are a man of God and yet in your day to day dealings you forget the basic commandments of Allah, then you are false to your claims. You stand corrected. If you say you are the representative of Allah but yet you are adamant in defending an untrue statement, you fail in your claim. Men of Allah, even if they are caliphs, Vicegerent or even Imams should guard their tongues against any type of falsehood. If they have been mistaken they should admit their mistakes and move on bearing in mind that they should not commit the same mistakes again in the future.

From such persons a high degree of probity is needed in all their affairs. You cannot be at the same time a man of God and a cheat. You are either one or the other. Hazrat Masih has called upon all Ahmadis to follow the subtle path of God-fearingness. How far should the leaders of this community strive to walk this delicate path. From what Allah has helped this humble one to understand, we should not let ourselves be impressed at all by the miracles performed by anyone; we should observe his actions and see how far they conform to the Shariah. If there is falsehood, backbiting, love for renown or any of the bad moral vices, one should remain away from such persons or such assemblies because they may corrupt your iman and your good moral qualities. If you frequent a perfume shop you will smell good. If you frequent a blacksmith or someone who makes charcoal, some soot will stick to your clothes even if you did not touch anything. As far as we are concerned we say “ Alhamdo lilla hillazi hadaana le haza wa maa kounna le nahtadeya law laa an hadaanallaho “ (7:43).It means “ All praise are due to Allah who has guided us to this. And we could not have found guidance if Allah had not guided us”

To end I would like to tell you about two revelations that I received this week. On Monday I received “ Shaan Daar Zalzalatous Saa'aa” which means “grand earthquake of the hour”. I immediately understood that something really bad was going to happen and I even told my wife about it. Then on Wednesday I received “ inna zalzalatas saa'aaté la shay'oune ajeeb ” which can be translated as “ Surely the earthquake of the hour is something very strange.

When I learned what happened in Bombay on Wednesday night I understood that most probably these two revelations were referring to these unprecedented terrorist attacks on the Indian soil. Besides its many other meanings as saa'a means a national calamity. the tragedy of Wednesday 26 th November which was still unfolding until this morning has killed 125 persons including 14 policemen and has injured more than 325 people besides speaking about damage done to buildings. People living in Bombay are in a state of shock. We in Jamaat Ahmadiyya Al Mouslemeen condemn any act of terrorism that attacks civilians whether they are Muslims or not. Those Muslims who perpetrate such cowardly acts denigrate Islam by their actions. Moreover the reason why they commit these acts is because they are being brainwashed to do so. Allah condemns such wanton violence and we do the same. A Muslim is someone who does not harm others . He is not someone who inflicts harm on others. May Allah open the heart of those who equate Islam with violence, both physical and psychological and give them the understanding that what they do is contrary to His Teachings. In this hour of distress we offer our deepest condolences to the bereaved families of the victims and we pray that peace may come back again in Bombay which has been described as a war zone since Wednesday night.