conditions in which all people, especially believers, face
intensified tests of their faith. Such tests, in which living
conditions are difficult and efforts are made to weaken or destroy
people's faith, are all described as fitna in Islamic sources.
The following hadith describes how believers' faith will weaken
prior to the Mahdi's coming and the causes thereof:
The Mahdi, one of my children, comes into being, by the blessing of
Allah, when the Day of Judgment approaches and the believers' hearts
weaken because of death, hunger, the disappearance of the Sunnah, the
emergence of innovations, and the loss of the means by which to enjoin
the right and forbid the wrong. His justice and prosperity will ease
the believers' hearts, and friendship and love will settle between the
non-Arab and the Arab nations. (Al-Muttaqi al-Hindi, Al-Burhan fi
`Alamat al-Mahdi Akhir al-Zaman, p. 66)
To summarize, the following events will take place before the Mahdi appears:
1) Death: Public security will disappear in the face of anarchy,
widespread slaughter, and the ensuing tension.
2) Hunger: The high cost of living, as well as catastrophes and
natural disasters, will cause a rise in hunger and famine.
3) Fitnas (Sedition): Sin will be encouraged and spread, and all
kinds of immoral actions will take place before people's eyes.
4) Un-Islamic innovations (bid`at): Customs that have no place in
true Islam and that were added on and gradually came to be accepted
as a true part of it, will emerge.
5) Being Unable to Preach the Religion: An emptiness caused by
being unable to teach how good is commanded and evil forbidden; in
other words, the preaching of religion.
Sedition enables strong believers to enhance their faith and
fortitude, as well as their degree in the Hereafter, whereas they
lead those with weak faith to become further removed from faith,
and those whose faith is artificial to lose it altogether. The Mahdi
will appear at a time when such a climate of corruption is being
experienced in its fullest and most violent form.
Another hadith imparts the tidings that there will be confusion,
sedition, and fear in the "west":
Disorder, sedition, and fear will emerge in the west... Sedition will
proliferate. (Mukhtasar Tazkirah Qurtubi)
Another hadith reveals that the Mahdi will come when sedition is everywhere:
A kind of sedition will surface from which no party will be able to
protect itself, and spread immediately in every direction. This
situation will persist until one comes and says: "O people, from now
on your leader is the Mahdi." (Ibn Hajar al-Haytahami, Al-Qawl
al-Mukhtasar fi `Alamat al-Mahdi al-Muntazar, p. 23)
In other words, a sedition that opposes religion and Allah will
target people's faith. Today, this sedition is materialist
philosophy, the supposed scientific basis of which is Darwin's
theory of evolution. Although it is completely irrational,
unscientific, and devoid of any scientific or logical proof,
materialist circles are seeking to impose this theory on every
society through intensive propaganda, deception, and
misrepresentation.
This theory enters our homes through the press and television,
whether we live in the West or in the Muslim world. Forming a part
of most science and other textbooks, it is imposed upon children
from the early grades through constant repetition, such as its most
famous claim: that people are descended from a common ancestor with
apes. Young people are fed these evolutionist lies from primary
school to the university.
In addition, the sedition referred to in the prophetic hadiths can
only become so widespread through modern-day technological means
(e.g., the press, publishing, the Internet, and satellite
communications). Indeed, such widespread sedition has never been
seen before today. All of these are important signs that the Mahdi's
coming coincides with our own time. The hadiths also state that
this sedition will end when the Mahdi comes.
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