Foreword

The mission of the Muslim Ummah is to convey the message of the Quran in the modern idiom to all humanity peacefully.

God has created man as an independent being and given him freedom in this world to test him. God wants to know who makes proper use of his freedom and who makes wrongful use of it. The Quran states that God “created death and life so that He might test you, and find out which of you is best in conduct.” (67:2). At another place, the Quran tells us that the jinns and mankind were created to worship God. (51:56) According to the interpretation of Mujahid Tabii, a disciple of Abdullah ibn Abbas, a senior Companion of the Prophet, worship in this verse means the realization of God. (Tafsir Al-Qurtubi, Vol. 17, p. 55) This realization is the realization of God and His creation plan. It means that man, using his unique mind, discovers his Creator: his Lord, and understands the creation plan of the Creator for him, that the present world is a selection ground. Here man is placed in a free environment to find out who proves himself to be the best in conduct. (67:2)

God, Who directs the course of this history while maintaining human freedom, will ultimately bring the world to an end on Doomsday. Subsequently, in God’s eyes, those who made proper use of the freedom granted to them will be set apart from those who made wrongful use of their freedom. One who realizes God in this world of test, submits to Him, and lives a God-oriented life will be held deserving of God’s highest blessings, that is, Paradise. God wants man to be made aware of this reality.

To select the deserving candidates for Paradise, the first arrangement made by the Creator was to inculcate in human nature the ability to identify right from wrong in the form of one’s conscience. This reality has been expressed in the Quran: After creating man, God “inspired him to understand what was right and wrong for him.” (91:8) This guidance of human nature to tell right from wrong is like an unspoken admonition. Every man and woman has a conscience that guides him from birth, albeit in a silent language.

Along with this, the Creator arranged for spoken guidance to be given to humanity. By this arrangement, God sent prophets in every age (35:24). These prophets were given guidance through God’s revelations. This is called ‘the straight path’ in the Quran (1:6). These prophets continued to come to the world in all ages. Adam, as well as being the first man, was also the first prophet. All the prophets who came after Adam until Prophet Muhammad have been counted and the figure has been put at 1,24,000 in a hadith (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 22288). The Quran refers by name to twenty-five prophets. However, none of these prophets has been historically established. Out of the whole history of the prophets, the Prophet Muhammad, the son of Abdullah, and grandson of Abdul Muttalib, is the only prophet who is a historical figure in the complete sense. A scholar has acknowledged this fact: “Muhammad was born within the full light of history.” (The Arabs: A Short History, Philip K. Hitti, London, 1960, p. 23)

After the Prophet of Islam, the Companions of the Prophet had a unique role: to counter the culture of associating God with things other than God and replace it with the desired divine culture of adoring God alone. This has been called the eradication of fitna in the Quran.  (8:39) It is owing to this extraordinary role of the Companions that a revolution was set in motion in human history. The Belgian historian, Henri Pirenne (d. 1935), says of this revolution:

“Islam changed the face of the globe. The traditional order of history was overthrown.” (Henri Pirenne, A History of Europe, London, 1958, p. 46)

A significant change brought about by the sacrifices of the Companions was that, for the first time in human history, the age of nature worship was replaced by the era of God worship. All the far-reaching changes made in human history in later centuries were the direct or indirect result of this revolution that the Companions brought about.

The third role in history is to be played by the group, which is called the Ikhwan (brothers) of the Prophet. According to a Hadith, the Prophet told his Companions, “I wish to see my brothers.” The Companions asked him if they were not his brothers. The Prophet replied, “No, you are my Companions. My brothers will come after me.” (Sahih Muslim, Hadith No. 249)

The Prophet’s contemporary believers who supported him in his mission are called the “Companions” of the Prophet. The “brothers” are those who will dedicate themselves to conveying this divine message to the people of the last phase of human history. In another Hadith, the mission of the Brothers of the Prophet is described thus:

“No home, small or great, will remain on earth, into which God has not caused the word of Islam to enter.” (Musnad Ahmad, Hadith No. 23814)

The Prophet of Islam started his mission in 610 AD in Makkah. The Prophet being the final messenger, God decreed a powerful team of followers for him, known as the Companions. According to a prediction of the Prophet, a powerful group of his followers would also be formed during the last phase of human history. This team is called Ikhwan-e-Rasool, the Brothers of the Prophet. With God’s exceptional support, this second team will play a vital role during the last phase of human history.

The Companions of the Prophet and the Brothers of the Prophet are two different groups of the Muslim Ummah; the latter will come into existence more than one thousand five hundred years after the former. Both are dayee groups. The Companions, with special divine support, destroyed the link between shirk and political power, which was a serious obstacle to the success of the divine mission they were entrusted with. The Brothers of the Prophet, on the other hand, will break the nexus between science and atheism and will turn the mission of monotheism into an ideological revolution.

The mission of the Muslim Ummah is to convey the preserved divine message to all humanity. The Quran was revealed to take the word of God into every home. In the last phase of human history, certain believers rising to the status of the Brothers of the Prophet will be able to attain the realization of God at a higher level by uncovering the signs of God hidden in nature. Then, equipped with new and powerful means of functioning, these people will be able to perform dawah work globally by taking the preserved message of God for humanity—Quran and Sunnah in the modern idiom—to the world.

Wahiduddin Khan

August 21, 2020
New Delhi, India