Ahmadiyyat - The Renaissance of Islam — Page 233
THE RENAISSANCE OF ISLAM 233 From that eminence both of us should simultaneously jump to the ground. Whichever of us survives shall be accepted as a saint and a holy man and the one who perishes will have demonstrated his falsehood. ' To him the Khalifatul Masih replied that he did not believe in any such extraordinary happening, nor did he claim that he could perform such a. feat. He considered such action foolish and an attempt at suicide which is forbidden by Islam as a grievous sin. He was not, therefore, prepared to accept the invitation of the Sufi Sahib. But if the Sufi Sahib felt that he could safely perform ~uch a feat, he was welcome to climb to the top of the Qutub Minar and jump from it. If he survived, he would be pre- pared to acclaim him as a saint and a holy man. Let it be said to the credit of Sufi Hasan Nizami Sahib that thereafter he always treated the Khalifatul Masih with great respect and reverence. On one of his visits to Delhi, the Sufi Sahib invited him and his companions to dinner at his residence in the environs of the Dargah. Nizamuddin Aulia. He asked him to lead the sunset Prayer service and himself joined in the service. In one of his books containing pen pictures of notables whom he knew personally, the Sufi Sahib set out a very appreciative and admiring sketch of the Khalifatul Masih. On a third occasion a Muslim divine invited him to a contest of public addresses in Arabic, proposing that which- ever of the two was adjudged, by a panel of umpires to be agreed upon, as having a better command of the Arabic language should be accepted as true in his stand on the matt. er of the truth of the claim of the Promised Messiah, and the other one as false in that respect. In answer to this the Khalifatul Masih pointed out that proficiency in any particu- lar language was in itself not proof that a person possessing such proficiency was necessarily equipped with the spiritual faculty of distinguishing between truth and falsehood. He added that his challenger would surely agree that Abu Jahl, the bitterest enemy of the Holy Prophet, peace be on him, in Mecca, had a greater command of Arabic than the challenger