Mahdi-Messianic Era Is Coming Soon If… – OpEd
World leaders have been meeting and failing for 29 years to try to curb global warming, and in that time Earth has become a much hotter and deadlier planet. Trillions of tons of ice have disappeared, the burning of fossil fuels has spewed billions of tons of heat-trapping gases into the air, and hundreds of thousands of people have died from heat and other weather disasters stoked by climate change.
Since 1992, global temperatures have increased on average almost 1.1°F (0.6°C), shattering the annual high-temperature record eight times, resulting in extreme weather disasters. Worldwide there have been nearly 8,000 climate, water and weather disasters, killing 563,735, according to the EMDAT disaster database.
NatureServe, a leading conservation research group, found that 40% of animals and 34% of plants in the United States are at risk of extinction, because 41% of ecosystems are facing collapse. Everything from crayfish and cacti to freshwater mussels are in danger of disappearing.
More than 1,000 tech companies laid off 154,336 employees in 2022 alone, according to Layoffs.fyi which tracks laid offs.
The Gun Violence Archive says mass shootings (four or more people injured or killed) in America have gone up significantly in recent years to more than 600 mass shootings a year.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a United Kingdom-based war monitor, estimates the total death toll in Syria to be about 610,000 after 12 years of civil war.
The incidence of adult diabetes in the United States has doubled over the last 20 years, afflicting 37.3 million people, according to the US Centers for Disease Control.
The World Bank fears a first-ever increase in the global extreme poverty rate, people getting by on less than $1.90 per day, from 8.4% to 9.3%.
And in France an estimated 216,000 children were victims of sex abuse by some 3,000 people — two-thirds of them priests — within France’s Catholic Church over the past 70 years, according to a major study of clerical sex abuse covered up by Catholic authorities.
Insects pollinate more than 80% of plants and are a major source of food for thousands of vertebrate species—but insect populations are collapsing all around the globe, and they continue to be overlooked by conservation efforts.
And the rate of ground-breaking scientific discoveries and technological innovation is slowing down despite an ever-growing amount of scientific knowledge, according to an analysis of 45 million scientific research papers and patents seeking disruptive discoveries that “break away from existing ideas” and “push the whole scientific field into new territory.” according to results published in the journal Nature.
The United Nations General Assembly on October 20, 2010 proclaimed the first week of February of each year as an Interfaith Harmony Week for all religions; recognizing “the imperative need for dialogue among faiths and religions in enhancing mutual understanding, harmony, and cooperation among people.” So I offer this article on the Mahdi-Messianic Era that is coming soon if we merit it.
For Muslims who despair about the terrible state of the modern world Adnan Oktar (Harun Yahya) writes in his book ‘Hazrat Mahdi Is a Descendant of the Prophet Abraham’: “As mentioned in Qur’an, Torah, Gospel, Psalms and the pages of Prophet Abraham, which are scriptures sent down to Messengers who lived in past centuries; Allah has revealed that these scriptures were guides for the societies to which they were sent; and our Lord reveals: “He has sent down the Book to you with truth, confirming what was there before it. And He sent down the Torah and the Gospel, previously, as guidance for mankind, and He has sent down the Furqan.” (Qur’an 2:3-4)
“Allah reveals this in another verse about the Torah: “We sent down the Torah containing guidance and light, and the Prophets who had submitted themselves gave judgment by it for the Jews–as did their scholars and their rabbis–by what they had been allowed to preserve of Allah’s Book to which they were witnesses. (Qur’an 5:44)
“In examining the portents of the End Times, we will also evaluate the related statements in the Torah and the Gospels in the light of the Qur’an and the Sunnah, and present the sections that are compatible with the divine verses of the Qur’an and the hadiths of our Prophet. For that reason, Muslims can find in this book, the passages relating the End Times from the Torah and the Gospels as well as the Qur’an.”
“The subject of the Mahdi” is one that has always occupied an important place in the Islamic world. Hoping that Hazrat Mahdi (as) will be instrumental in making the afflictions Muslims suffered, the intellectual systems based on denial, unfair and unjust practices, conflicts and wars pervading the world will come to an end, believers have always awaited the coming of this blessed individual in their own times.”
As a Reform Rabbi who also believes that the world wide upheavals we see are part of the birth pains of the Messianic Age, I offer Muslims some insights from the Jewish Prophets and Rabbinic Sages. Many Jews, Christians and Muslims believe the war of Gog and Magog (Gog u-Magog in Hebrew and “Yajuj and Majuj” in Arabic) is coming in the 21st century.
It is true that human society changed more rapidly, violently and fundamentally in the last 150 years than ever before in history. Doctors saved the lives of millions. Dictators sacrificed the lives of millions. Populations are exploding in Africa and populations are declining in Europe. Technology produces both worldwide prosperity and worldwide pollution at the same time.
Should we look upon the future with optimistic hope or with fatalistic trepidation? Is the world and our society heading towards a wonder-filled new age, or toward a doomsday? Or are both occurring almost concurrently because breakdown is always a prelude to breakthrough?
Jews, whose Biblical prophets were the ones who first wrote about a future Messianic Age, recognize that the birth of a Messianic Age must be preceded by its birth-pangs. But the prophets of Israel also emphasize the glories of a future world living in peace and prosperity with justice for all.
Ancient Jewish prophecies did proclaim that there would be an end to the world as we know it. But they did not prophesy that the world will come to an end, nor did the Prophets of Israel offer an exact date for the transition. The exact advent of the Messianic Age is not knowable because humans have free will and thus the exact time and manner of redemption cannot be determined in advance. Much depends on what we humans do.
The beginning of the Messianic Age is a time of transition from one World Age into another. How we move through this transition, either with resistance or acceptance, will determine whether the transformation will happen through cataclysmic changes or by a gradual reform of human society; which will lead to a world filled with peace, prosperity and spiritual tranquility.
The Prophets of Israel conceived redemption as a transformation of human society that would occur through the catalyst of the Jewish community. This transformation, which will take place in this world at some future time, is called the Messianic Age. The transition to the Messianic Age is called the birth pangs of the Messiah. The birth of a redeemed Messianic world may be the result of an easy or difficult labor. If everyone would simply live according to the moral teachings of his or her religious tradition, we would ourselves have helped bring about the Messianic Age.
But, if we do not do it voluntarily, it will come about through social and political upheavals, worldwide conflicts and generation gaps. The Messiah (Mahdi) refers to one or more human agents of God who help bring about this positive transformation.
The Jewish tradition teaches that this agent of God (together with several forerunners and many disciples) will be a human being, a descendant of Prophets Abraham and David, with great qualities of national leadership similar to Prophet Moses and Prophet Mohammed. The arrival of the Messianic Age is what’s really important, not the personality of the agents who bring it about, since they are simply the instruments of God, who ultimately is the real Redeemer.
The Islamic 1400s we are now living in, is the age of the coming of Hazrat Mahdi. Prophet Jesus will also return to Earth in this century, Hazrat Mahdi will appear, and the moral values of Islam will rule the world. As Prophet Micah proclaims: “In the last days the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established as the highest of the mountains; it will be exalted above the hills, and peoples will stream to it. Many nations will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the temple of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.
“The Torah will go out from Zion, the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He will judge between many peoples and will settle disputes for strong nations far and wide. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor train for war anymore. Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the LORD GOD has spoken. All the nations may walk in the name of their gods, but we (Jews, Christians and Muslims) will walk in the name of the LORD our God for ever and ever.” (Prophet Micah 4:1-5)
And Prophet Malachi states: “See, I will send Prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful [Judgement] day of the Lord comes. He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.”(Malachi 4:5-6)
One of the signs of the End of Days is the arrival and defeat of Gog and Magog (Ya’juj and Ma’juj or Ajuj and Majuj). Gog and Magog appear in the Hebrew Bible, the Christian Bible, and the Islamic Quran as individuals, tribes, or lands.
The Quran mentions Gog and Magog twice: “He said: “This (barrier) is a mercy from my Lord: but when the warning of my Lord comes to pass, He will reduce it to dust (and Gog and Magog—the Colonialist Empires, the Nazis, and the Communists would be released into the world); and the promise of my Lord is true.” (18:98) So Gog and Magog are destructive groups like the Colonialist Empires, the Nazis, and the Communists, who near the end of days will penetrate into every part of the world.
And Prophet Ezekiel states: “God says to Gog (of the land of Magog ), “You will come from your place in the far north, you and many nations with you, all of them riding on horses, a mighty army. You will advance against my people Israel like a cloud that covers the land.” (38:15–16)
Prophet Joel provides further details about the demise of the northern alliance of Iran, Iraq, Syria. Lebanon and the most northern Russia. The Lord promises to repel the northern army and have the defeated northern army face the east sea (the Dead Sea) and its rear end towards the utmost sea (the Mediterranean Sea): “But I will remove far off from you (Israel) the northern army, (of the northern alliance of Iran, Iraq, Syria. Lebanon and most north of all, Russia) and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his rear end toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savor shall come up, because he has done great (destructive) things.” (Joel 2:20)
The other mention of Gog and Magog in the Quran is: “But there is a ban on a town which We have destroyed: that they (the people of the town) shall not return (to reclaim that town as their own); until Gog and Magog are let through (the barrier), and swiftly spread out in every direction.” (21:95-96)
This verse refers to Jerusalem, destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE, and only reclaimed 18 1/2 centuries later as the State of Israel’s capital, during the era of the defeat of of the Nazis, the Communists, and the Colonialist Empires, who had been Gog and Magog for generations.
Thus, humanity has so far passed through the most devastating era of human history. However, we have not yet reached the goal of the Messianic Age when “They (all nations) will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the LORD GOD has spoken.” (Prophet Micah 4:2-4)
This era will come about when Israelis and Palestinians make a long lasting two state partnership peace; thus fulfilling the 2700 year old vision of Prophet Isaiah: “In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt, and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day Israel will join a three-party alliance with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing upon the heart. The LORD of Hosts will bless them saying, “Blessed be Egypt My people, Assyria My handiwork, and Israel My inheritance.” (Isaiah 19:23-5)
Then an ancient Jewish legend predicts that when the Messiah-Mahdi comes and resurrection day occurs; the Kaab’a in holy Mecca, will go to join the Temple Mount’s Foundation Stone in holy Jerusalem, bringing with it the inhabitants of Mecca, and they shall all be joined together. When the Foundation Stone sees the Kaab’a approaching, it shall cry out, “Peace be to the great guest”. ( Zev Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem)
