Question:
As Salamu Alaikum.
Does Moulana believe if he is the avatar of the age.?
1894 To 1969.He is a spiritual master who declared publicly in 1954 that he was the avatar of the age.
He also said in 1963 at Guruprasad that every avatar had a weakness:
Buddha explained nirvana to his disciples but failed to explain all about nirvikalpa and the states beyond nirvana such as majzoobiyat, sulukiyat and qutubiyat, and that was a weakness, for people today think Buddha regarded the end of the Path as a zero condition.
When Arjuna persisted in regarding Krishna as a companion and would not fight the battle which had to be fought, Krishna showed him his virat swaroop (Universal Form). That was a weakness.
Muhammad never told the people he was God but said he was just another man and that the Koran came from Gabriel. That was a weakness. !!!!!!!!!
Answer:
wa `alaykum salam,
Do not confuse servanthood to Almighty Allah with weakness.
Considerable care must be taken with the claims of Meher Baba. Given his preference for the company of majdhubs, we should at least be wary of what is known in Sufism as “ecstatic utterances” – though in his case the word “utterances” should be modified to account for his refusal to speak!
Confusion has very often resulted from attempts to synthesize the Hindu doctrine of the avatar with Islam. To begin with, the word “avatar” signifies the “descent” of a principle into the realm of manifestation. In its most primordial sense, this transcendent principle has, in fact, quite rightly been identified as having a correspondence with the Ruh or Nur of Muhammad as the principle of all prophethood, peace and blessings be upon him eternally.
In the Hindu context, the word avatar has been used in myriad particular examples, but primarily in reference to ten manifestations of Vishnu. You are right, therefore, in identifying Krishna as an avatar. Concerning the historical Buddha, there are many who would like to identify him as the ninth or “foreign” avatar; after all, his followers are found almost entirely outside Hindustan. The expression “avatar of the age” should refer to the tenth or Kalki Avatar, who Meher Baba apparently was not. There is very little reason to doubt that this final avatar is to be identified with the descent of Jesus – peace be upon him – at the end of time to vanquish the embodiment of evil and inaugurate the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth.
No doubt Abd al-Razzaq Yahya is right to warn against equating the Last Prophet with an avatar. The function of an avatar must be to embody a “descending realization,” and may be understood to belong to the asrar rabbaniyya or “lordly mysteries.” To limit the life of the Prophet Muhammad – peace and blessings be upon him – to this aspect must ignore the clearest example of “ascending realization” in the history of humanity, the Mi`raj. In other words, in relation to his Lord the Prophet is the perfection of `abduhu wa rasuluh.
Indeed this balance is especially relevant now, when the word “avatar” is so common, since the mission of the Anti-Christ is to demand a “lordship” over his followers while refusing servanthood to the Lord of Heavens. So while Jesus will quite literally “descend” to establish his kingdom on Earth, he will nevertheless first display his servanthood in deference to the perfect example of the Sultan ul-anbiya.
As Mawlana Shaykh Hisham has explained, there may be 124,000 Adams, but there is only one Sayyidina Muhammad (s) and Allah knows best.
Mahmoud Shelton
