Fazle Umar
Attempt on the life of Hadhrat Khalifatul Masih II [ra] In March 1954 Hadhrat Mirza Bashiruddin Mahmud Ahmad, Khalifatul Masih II [ra] completed forty years of his Khilafat. It will be appreciated that from the moment of his election to his sacred and exalted office, the Khalifatul Masih had been continuously preoccupied with problems of a baffling variety and volume calling for the exercise of the highest qualities of astonishing diversity, however, on no occasion was he found wanting. If he had confined himself entirely to urging the Community towards the maintenance of a high standard of moral and spiritual qualities, that in itself would have been a full-time occupation, calling for the very best that any human being could put forth. Under his wise and fostering care, reinforced by his continuous humble and earnest supplications to the Divine, in all seasons and at all hours, but more particularly during the latter part of the night, the Community had grown vastly in numbers and was now spread all around the globe. Its constant care and supervision, the provision of comfort and consolation for different sections in diverse situations of trial and tribulation, the constant urging towards higher achievement in all walks of life, the demand for the upholding of the highest moral and spiritual values, imposed upon the Khalifatul Masih a heavy strain which, but for the Grace and Mercy of God, would have destroyed a lesser person within the space of a few years. His high and sterling qualities and characteristics had, however, been presaged in glowing and superlative terms by God Himself in the prophecies set out in the announcement of his revered father of 20 February 1886. Every one of them was illustrated and fulfilled in an astonishing manner, in the face of the most adverse combination of circumstances during the course of more than half a century of his Khilafat. To the members of the Movement he was, at all times, a deeply loving father to whom they could look at all
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