Christianity - A Journey from Facts to Fiction — Page 151
Christianity Today 151 romantic fantasy of Christian hopes and aspirations then, as such, this incident will never happen. Never shall the world see this bizarre event of some god descending from heaven in human form along with a troop of angels supporting him and singing his hymns. The very idea is repulsive to human logic and human con- science. It is the wildest fairy tale that was ever invented to lull the faculties of a people. On the other hand if the Ahmadiyya understanding of Jesus Christ as is accepted, it would replace this fantastic scenario with one which is not only acceptable to human understanding, but is also powerfully supported by the entire religious history of mankind. In that case we would be expecting a saviour no different from the Christ as of the first advent. We would be expecting a humble man, born of humble origins like Jesus Christ as of the first advent, to begin his ministry in the same style as he once did. He would belong to a religious people resembling the Jews of Judea, both in their traits and circum- stances. They would not only reject and disown him at his claim to be the Promised Reformer, which they were expecting as their redeemer from God, but would also do all that lay within their powers to annihilate him. He would relive the life of Christ as all over again and would be treated with the same contempt, hatred and arrogance. He would suffer once again, not at the hands of his own people, but at the hands of hostile forces similar to those which opposed him before. He would also suffer at the hands of the supreme foreign imperial power under whose canopy he would be born among an enslaved people.