Makkah Grand Mosque attacker claims to be Imam Mehdi: report
Dawn.com Published May 24, 2021 - Updated about 9 hours
A man who attempted to attack an imam at Makkah's Grand Mosque last week is a Saudi national who claimed to be the awaited Imam Mehdi, Saudi media reported on Sunday.
The armed man, in his 40s, was seen on live television charging towards the imam's pulpit on Friday but was intercepted by fast-acting security officers and subsequently arrested.
Initial investigations by police revealed that the attacker claimed to be Imam Mehdi (messiah), Arab News reported.
The imam, Sheikh Bandar Baleelah, continued delivering the Friday sermon as the attacker, dressed in ihram, was tackled and removed from the mosque, Islam's holiest site.
The man has also been medically examined to gauge his mental ability, according to a Gulf News report.
In Islamic belief, Imam Mehdi (Arabic: “guided one”) is "a messianic deliverer who will fill earth with justice and equity, restore true religion, and usher in a short golden age lasting seven, eight, or nine years before" the Day of Judgement, according to Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Throughout history, a number of people have claimed to be Islam’s redeemer. In the most high-profile such incident to have occurred to date, a preacher named Juhayman Al-Otaibi and his brother-in-law Mohammed Al-Qahtani, who claimed to be the Mehdi, took hundreds of pilgrims hostage at the Grand Mosque in 1979.
The siege lasted more than two weeks before security forces broke into the mosque, killing the self-proclaimed messiah and hundreds of his followers.
In March this year, a knife-wielding man shouting slogans in support of terrorist outfits was arrested after being spotted on the first floor of the Grand Mosque.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1625472/makka ... hdi-report
FAKE MEHDI
Re: FAKE MEHDI
Syed Ahamad Junpuri was born in 847 Hijra in the city of Junpur, and died on 911 Hijra in the town of Frah in Afghanistan. Syed Sahib had no equal in piety and faith. He fasted for seven years continuously, and always remained busy in offering prayers and worship, and lived a life of a recluse. It is said that it was during the period of meditation that he heard a supernatural voice calling Antta Mehdi you are Mehdi). In the beginning he attached no significance to this voice, but when this voice continued to echo in his ears at different times for many years, he was convinced of its message. Thereafter he began to have himself called Mehdi.
The literal meaning of Mehdi is the ‘guided one’. From this point of view every religious guide can call himself a Mehdi, (and prophesies are well-known about the Mehdi) but in the light of ‘Ahadith’ and tradition this title holds the position of a proper noun and there are some well-known prophesies about the Mehdi. For instance his waging war against the Jews and Christians, bringing about the revival of Islam, to acquire the hidden treasure in the Holy Ka’aba and distributing them etc. This is the reason the Muslims are opposed to the use of this title in an ordinary sense, and attach special expectation with the Mehdi. So when Syed Muhammad Miran Junpuri started calling himself by the title of Mehdi, the Muslims in general and religious scholars in particular opposed him. Afterward his followers, exceeding the limits of moderation, began to compare him with ‘Mehdi Aakhar-uzzaman (the latter day Mehdi). Those who have revived the ‘Mujadad and Mehdi-I-Islam have been considered religious guides. It is usually considered that after every thousand years a ‘Mujadad’ is born when the Muslims for sake religion and many apostasies are born in religion. But a Mehdi has to be born only once to remove more or less the evils of this kind. So far many claimants to the title of Mehdi have been born. As a matter of fact their movements were the links of a chain similar to the movement, which in the modern idiom is known as Pan Islamism, the specific purpose of which has been the establishment of the hegemony (of Muslims) over the world.
Adopted from the book "Shah Latif and his message" by G M SYED.
The literal meaning of Mehdi is the ‘guided one’. From this point of view every religious guide can call himself a Mehdi, (and prophesies are well-known about the Mehdi) but in the light of ‘Ahadith’ and tradition this title holds the position of a proper noun and there are some well-known prophesies about the Mehdi. For instance his waging war against the Jews and Christians, bringing about the revival of Islam, to acquire the hidden treasure in the Holy Ka’aba and distributing them etc. This is the reason the Muslims are opposed to the use of this title in an ordinary sense, and attach special expectation with the Mehdi. So when Syed Muhammad Miran Junpuri started calling himself by the title of Mehdi, the Muslims in general and religious scholars in particular opposed him. Afterward his followers, exceeding the limits of moderation, began to compare him with ‘Mehdi Aakhar-uzzaman (the latter day Mehdi). Those who have revived the ‘Mujadad and Mehdi-I-Islam have been considered religious guides. It is usually considered that after every thousand years a ‘Mujadad’ is born when the Muslims for sake religion and many apostasies are born in religion. But a Mehdi has to be born only once to remove more or less the evils of this kind. So far many claimants to the title of Mehdi have been born. As a matter of fact their movements were the links of a chain similar to the movement, which in the modern idiom is known as Pan Islamism, the specific purpose of which has been the establishment of the hegemony (of Muslims) over the world.
Adopted from the book "Shah Latif and his message" by G M SYED.