By God — Page 46
46 Footnote Arba'in 1 It is sad that in the competition of (Quranic) knowledge, ignorant people have unjustly declared Peer Maher Ali Shah Golarhvi as victorious and have abused me and declared me stupid and ignorant. (They felt) that I was overawed by this expert and genius of rare talent. But on the contrary he with purity of heart had come to Lahore to compete in writing an Arabic commentary (of The Holy Quran) But, I ran away seeing his majestic glory and literary prowess. O! Heavens, curse the liars !. Amen. Dear listeners, to abase the liars, God Almighty put a thought in my heart on that very day, Friday, the 7th December 1900 CE, and I swear whose Hell is blazing fire for the liars that on seeing blatant lies I myself had requested for this supernatural competition. If Peer Maher Ali Shah had not put the condition of pledging allegiance with the written debate with which my purpose was lost, then even if Lahore and Qadian had snow clapped mountains and even if the days were of winter, I would have still reached Lahore and shown him what Heavenly Sign is. (Ruhani khaza’in Volume 18 pp. 448-449) 1 Arba'in is the name of a book by the Promised Messiah a. s. . Arba'in means ‘forty’. The Promised Messiah a. s. planned to write 40 Ishtiharat, i. e. public announcements, that were to be published, dealing with the objections and allegations of the opponents.