A Mighty Striving Life and work of Maulana Muhammad Ali World-renowned author, scholar, missionary of Islam and Head of Lahore Ahmadiyya Movement ahmadiyya.org & aaiil.org Maulana Muhammad Ali said: “… it is my firm conviction, which I acquired from that holy man (Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad) from whose company I benefited for a long time, that if we show the world the real picture of the truth of Islam, of the Holy Prophet Muhammad, and of the Quran, then undoubtedly people will bow their heads before it.” — p. 372 “All of us must cherish but one desire, and only this must fill our hearts when we bow before God: that may the Divine religion, the Quran and Muhammad the Messenger of Allah be triumphant … Ask only of this, yearn only for this, shed tears only for this, seek that which has been destined to happen.” — p. 318 A Mighty Striving English Translation of Mujahid-i Kabir, The biography of Maulana Muhammad Ali Renowned author, scholar and missionary of Islam by Muhammad Ahmad with co-author Mumtaz Ahmad Faruqui Translated from Urdu by Mrs. Akhtar Jabeen Aziz Revised and edited by Dr. Zahid Aziz Ahmadiyya Anjuman Isha‘at Islam Lahore Inc. Ohio, U.S.A. ahmadiyya.org & aaiil.org Original Urdu book first published 1962 First Edition of English Translation 2004 © 2004 by Ahmadiyya Anjuman Isha‘at Islam Lahore, Inc. P.O. Box 3370, Dublin, Ohio 43016, U.S.A. Website: www.muslim.org All Rights Reserved. The Ahmadiyya Anjuman Isha‘at Islam (Ahmadiyya Association for the Propagation of Islam) was founded at Lahore, Pakistan, in 1914 by the prominent followers of Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad. It exists to promote a liberal, tolerant and peaceful picture of Islam, as found in the Holy Quran and the life of the Holy Prophet Muhammad. It has published a vast quantity of highly-regarded literature on Islam in various languages, and has branches and members in several countries. ISBN: 0–913321–96–6 Preface Mujahid-i Kabir, the biography of Maulana Muhammad Ali, was written in Urdu by his son Muhammad Ahmad, with Mumtaz Ahmad Faruqui as co-author,1 and published in 1962. It was soon recognised as an authoritative book not only on the life of the Maulana but also on the broad history of the Ahmadiyya Anjuman Isha‘at Islam Lahore from 1914 to 1951 and the earlier history of the relationship between this body’s founding stalwarts and the Founder of the Ahmadiyya Movement Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad. It is also an invaluable book in laying out the mission and goal of the Lahore Ahmadiyya organisation and showing that it is true to the teachings of Hazrat Mirza both in its beliefs and its work. This book removes many misconceptions about Maulana Muhammad Ali and the Lahore Ahmadiyya body, particularly in connection with the reasons for the Split in 1914. An abridged English translation of this book by Mumtaz Ahmad Faruqui, shortened to about one-fifth of the original, was published in 1966 under the title Muhammad Ali, The Great Missionary of Islam. In the Foreword it is stated that the conden- sed translation should satisfy the needs of the English-reading public abroad as the details in the Urdu account are only of local interest. However, circumstances have changed since that time in two respects: the name of Maulana Muhammad Ali has become more widespread due to the increasing distribution of his writings throughout the world, and there are now many more members of the Lahore Ahmadiyya community itself living in countries where the first language is not Urdu. Therefore an English translation of the whole book had become an urgent necessity. 1. For more about the authors, see Appendix 2 in this translation, p. 531. i ii PREFACE The work of translation was undertaken by Mrs. Akhtar Aziz, M.A., M.Ed., who retired as a teacher of English in U.K. schools after 28 years of service, following an earlier teaching service of 13 years in Pakistan where she rose to Headmistress. She also obtained a certificate from the University of Texas at Austin, U.S.A., in teaching English as a Second Language. She has also been an experienced translator between English and Urdu/Punjabi for various bodies in the U.K. legal and justice system, receiving a Police award for her work. Besides these qualifications, Mrs. Aziz feels a personal, poignant association with the book Mujahid-i Kabir as she had observed and lived close to many of the leading figures featuring in this biography including Maulana Muhammad Ali. For about the first thirty years of her life, till the mid-1950s, she lived in the Muslim Town suburb of Lahore in the house of her father, Maulana Abdul Haq Vidyarthi, in close proximity to other leading Ahmadis including Maulana Muhammad Ali him- self. She had also spent a summer in Dalhousie in 1939 with the Lahore Ahmadiyya members who used to repair there for the hot season as recounted in this book. After Mrs. Aziz had written out the entire translation by hand, painstakingly and meticulously, and the text had been typed into computer form by volunteers of the Lahore Ahmadiyya comm- unity, it fell to me to check and revise it and prepare it for final publication. The chief aspects of the work which I then carried out are listed below. 1. The translation was carefully compared with the original Urdu text and revised as necessary. It was formatted for printing in the shape and design of this book. 2. While going through the Urdu text, any details that seemed inaccurate, for example dates of events, were checked in external sources and corrected when required. 3. At some points, additional relevant material was inserted from external, original sources. In all such places in this translation, the sources of the additions are indicated in footnotes. Major examples of extra material are the reviews at the end of chapter 3.3, the obituaries at the end of chapter 3.8, and various additions within Part 4. PREFACE iii 4. In the original book, several quotations and reviews are reproduced in Urdu translation that were originally in English. In almost every such case I succeeded in tracing the original English text, and that has been reproduced along with a footnote to indicate this. 5. The list of writings of Maulana Muhammad Ali given at the end of the Urdu book was checked thoroughly. Some omissions and minor inaccuracies in dates of publication and titles have been rectified. See Appendix 1. 6. It was considered indispensable to add brief information about the authors of Mujahid-i Kabir. This has been done in the form of Appendix 2. 7. Mujahid-i Kabir had no index. The English translation would have suffered from a serious handicap as a reference book if an index had not been provided. Despite this task being time-consuming, laborious and complex, I compiled an index which I hope will be found useful. It was difficult to strike the right balance between making the index too long and detailed, or leaving it inadequate. As the translation of each chapter was completed it was made available on our website www.muslim.org during 2001 to 2004 in html format, where the entire book can now be viewed. The Urdu book contains several photographs, but unfortu- nately their reproduction quality is not sufficiently good to reprint from them. My sustained efforts to locate the original photographs through various contacts have so far not been successful. Similarly, issues of The Light and Paigham Sulh of the later years of Maulana Muhammad Ali’s life contain many photographs, but again these cannot be reprinted from those magazines to an acceptable quality, and the originals cannot be found. Our efforts will be continued, and if successful the photographs will be inclu- ded in a future edition of this translation. We regret that this visual treasure could not be published at this stage. The title of the Urdu book, Mujahid-i Kabir, meaning ‘The Great Mujahid’ or the great one in striving in the way of God, is based on the verse of the Quran: “and strive against them a mighty iv PREFACE striving (jihad kabir) with it”,2 where the words “with it” mean with the Quran. This is a command to every Muslim to undertake a great struggle, or great jihad, to spread the teachings of the Quran in the world by word and pen. As such a striving was at the heart of the work of Maulana Muhammad Ali, his Urdu biography was appropriately titled after this verse. In English we may represent the same title as A Mighty Striving. Zahid Aziz October 2004 2. Holy Quran, 25:52. Contents Part 1: The First Twenty-Five Years — From birth to May 1899 Family history ................................................................ 1 Birth and early education ............................................... 3 Education and employment in Lahore ........................... 4 Meeting Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad of Qadian ......... 6 Letter from father on Muhammad Ali’s bai‘at ............ 11 Stay in Lahore after joining the Ahmadiyya Movement ........................................ 12 Correspondence with Hazrat Mirza sahib and arrangements for legal practice ........................... 13 Part 2: Life at Qadian — From May 1899 to April 1914 2.1: The Promised Messiah’s Time .................................... 21 Migration to Qadian and the early days ....................... 21 Residing in the Promised Messiah’s house .................. 23 The early writings of the Promised Messiah about Maulana Muhammad Ali .......................................... 27 Publication of the Review of Religions ......................... 28 Hazrat Mirza sahib’s wishes regarding propagation of Islam ................................. 34 First photograph of Maulana Muhammad Ali .............. 36 The dreams, visions, revelations and writings of Hazrat Mirza sahib about Maulana Muhammad Ali .