ABRAHAM (IBRAHIM)
The Birth of Abraham
Abraham (Hazrat Ibrahim) was born in the fifth generation from A” abed and during the reign of a tyrant known as Nimrod (Namrood). Nimrod, a powerful king, made his subjects bow to him as a god. One night he dreamt that a star rose from the horizon and its brilliance eclipsed the moon and the sun. He woke up wondering about the interpretation of his dream. He summoned the astrologers and fortunetellers to come up with the most acceptable explanation of his dream. They conferred with one another and told him: ‘A person will be born in your kingdom who will wreck your power and destroy your influence. He asked if that person had actually been born or would be born in the near future. They told him that he was not yet born. Upon hearing that, Nimrod ordered a ban on all marriages, separating men from women and ordered the killing of all new borns.
God is All Powerful and All Knowing. His intentions come to be whenever Ile deems them to be. The mother of Abraham successfully concealed her pregnancy. She went out of the city limits and gave birth to her child in a cave. She stayed in that cave with her child until the senseless slaughter of the new borns had come to an end and the king’s own fear of his destruction had abated. By this time Abraham had grown up to be a tall and handsome lad. They returned to their ancestral home in the city of Ur.
His Intelligence, Cognition and Rejection of Idolatry:
In those days people believed in the celestial bodies as their deities. One night. Abraham also selected the brightest of all the stars for his observation. By the morning its light faded and it disappeared. He thought that the most brilliant of the stars could not be the creator as it faded away in the brightness of another celestial body. Similarly he noted that the moon changed phases and was but a shadow in front of the brightness of the sun. He concluded that the moon could not be the creator either. He pondered if the sun was the ultimate god, as he had also noted people bowing in subjugation to the sun. But the sun was out only for the duration of the day and gave way to the stars and the moon at night. He reflected upon this phenomenon and concluded that the one who put these celestial bodies in their respective places has the supreme power over them and must be the God Almighty, even though He was not visible or physically tangible. He was pleased with this conclusion and enthusiastically began to tell people how wrong they all had been to ignore the obvious power behind their daily lives, the Supreme power of God. He invited them to give up their false gods and return to the truth.
Some laughed at his idea, some ignored him as he was only a youth “with little knowledge of life,” while others got offended and admonished him for his lack of respect for their gods.
They invited him to come to the annual festival and see for himself how they had decorated their gods along with fabulous offerings brought over from far and wide. Abraham excused himself and did not go to the festival. As the town people had all gone to the fair grounds to indulge in their festivities, Abraham went to their temple, broke all their idols and left his axe hanging on the shoulder of the biggest of them all in the center of the temple.
Next day when people went to the temple and saw what had happened to their gods, they knew that Abraham had done it since he had made no secret of his dislike of those idols. The village chief asked Abraham if he knew who had broken their idols. Abraham, pointing towards the big idol said, “Why don’t you ask him?” The chief said, “How could a stone idol do such a deed?” Thereupon Abraham said, “If the stone idol was incapable of doing it. or protect itself and the other idols, how could it be a God, the provider and the protector?” They obviously had no answer to the logic of Abraham. However, they were not prepared to follow his path. They wanted him punished
for being disrespectful to their gods. They sent a deputation to Nimrod, their god-king for a judgement against Abraham. Abraham was summoned to the court of Nimrod to answer his charges and
face the punishment. When all the people had gathered in the court, Nimrod arrived. All subjects bowed down to the ground for their total submission except Abraham who remained upright and did not bow to the king-god. When asked why he refused to bow to him, Abraham replied that he submitted only to his God, The Creator, The Sustainer. This was an open insult to the king who commanded an absolute power over his subjects and claimed himself to be a god. By his act. Abraham provoked the king’s wrath. However, surprised at the courage of Abraham, the king decided to question him.
Debate in the Court of Nimrod on the existence of God
The king asked Abraham to explain to the entire audience who his God was. Abraham said that his God was one who gave life and who took it away. The king said that he did. that every day!
Abraham said that his God brought forth the sun from the cast. He asked the king that if he had the power, could he cause the sun to rise from the west! Clearly the king was unable to carry out such a feat.
The king then turned around and asked Abraham why he had broken all the idols in the temple. He gave the same reply to the king as he had given to the chief of the village before. The king said to Abraham that he knew that the idols did not talk and yet he kept on referring to the biggest of them to answer the question that actually pertained to him. Abraham said that since the king and all his subjects knew that idols did not talk, why then they worshiped them as gods.
As there were no answers to the logic of Abraham, the king ordered his courtiers to dig a large pit, light a wood fire and throw Abraham in it alive, to make an example so that nobody would again disobey or ridicule their god-king.
Aal-e-Qutub Aal-e-Syed Abdullah Shah Ghazi 