WILL AN ISRAELI ATTACK ON IRAN PROVOKE THE EMERGENCE OF ANOTHER FALSE MAHDI?

Prophet Muhammad prophesied the advent of an Imām who would emerge by Divine decree to lead the world of Islam at that time when the true Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary (peace and blessings of Allah Most High be upon them all), was about to return. The Prophet declared of that end-time Imām that he would arise from within the ranks of the Muslims: “How would you be”, he said, “when the son of Mary descends amongst you and your Imām would be from your own ranks!” (Sahīh Bukhāri).

An Imām in the religion of Islam is both a religious as well as a political leader; hence the office of the Imām is synonymous with that of Amīr or Khalīfa (Caliph). The Hadīth therefore prophesied that one (Islamic) government would eventually rule over the entire world of Islam, and that the Imām would be both the political as well as the religious head of that government.

This prophecy anticipated the present sorry status quo in which the Islamic Khilāfah (Caliphate) has been replaced by republican so-called Islamic States based on petty tribal nationalisms – Egyptian, Saudi, Pakistani, Arab, Malay, Punjabi, Bengali, Persian (Iranian) etc. African-American Muslims have even embraced Louis Farrakhan’s ‘black Muslim nationalism’. Some of them, such as Turkey and Bangladesh have even imposed secular constitutional bans preventing Islam from playing any political role in the affairs of the State.