November 10, 2009
Twenty years ago today, we marked the beginning of an era for which we have found no name so far. Along with the official opening of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, on Friday, November 10, 1989, we began to live in a period that we have learned to call - simply - as the post-cold-war era.
Although some people seem to hold November 9, as an important date because, on that day in year 1989, many marked the end of tyranny – at least as to the tyranny of the imposed communism, - why, though, is it important that we must remember this bad episode of history by its tail-end – i.e. November 9?
This was an episode so bad in deed, that it was born out of the murders of millions of innocent men, women and children during the holocaust and it swallowed up millions more during its tenure, and still took along millions in its own aftermath.
May I suggest - let’s remember the November 9 as a reference point only – as it did lead us to the next day, a brighter day when people walked unreservedly into the free world through the Brandenburg Gate, and many other gates along the Berlin Wall.
In my view, the 10th of November – the birthday of the post-cold-war era - is a good day; a happy day to remember the freedom and pursuit of happiness by; and that to me is the most important aspect of that date.
The year 1989 also marked the end of the first and the beginning of the second century of Ahmadiyya Islam, and the date ‘Friday the 10th’ seems to be a fine crossroads between the nature of the two events – a span of the world and the spirit.
The Friday is a blessed day in Islam, a day called as Eid, a festive day – a day of acceptance of prayers. The date, November 10, is a happy day for the millions of people who found themselves freed from the clutches of oppression – thus making that particular Friday the 10th, which had happened to fall in November 1989, as the day to remember and celebrate.
Coincidently, prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall, the spiritual head of the Worldwide Ahmadiyya Muslim Community at that time, late, Hazrat Mirza Tahir Ahmad had recorded a unique dream, in where he was shown the words ‘Friday the 10th’ - which makes it an exceptional happenstance here. Perhaps beginnings are the most important to remember after all.
The writer is the editor of Ahmadiyya Times.
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