Fulfilment of a Grand Prophecy - Hazrat Ahmad’s Challenge to John Alexander Dowie — Page 20
20. Fulfillment of a Grand Prophecy "In view of the fact that Ahmad appears to have Dr. Dowie in a corner, it may be possible that the latter will prefer to stay there rather than come out in the open and leave the world with great sorrow and torment. ". This quotation from from the Commercial. Advertiser of New York does not leave any necessity for the reproduction of the announcement itself. But it may be added that the notice is concluded with a long prayer in which Divine. Judgment is implored to decide between truth and falsehood. The first sentence of this prayer runs thus: "I close these brief remarks with the following prayer. O powerful and perfect. God, who hast ever been revealing and wilt ever continue to reveal Thyself to Thy prophets, do Thou give Thy judgment and show to Thy people the imposture and falsehood of Dowie and Pigott, for Thy weak creatures having taken to human worship and trusted in weak mortals like themselves, have fallen away from Thy path and are wandering in errors far from. Thee. ". Thus did the Promised Messiahas pray to God three and a half years ago to show to the world his truth and the imposture of a false claimant by His judgment, and it is to this Divine judgment that we now desire to call the attention of the public. . In connection with this announcement the following facts should be specially noticed: 1. It was not simply a challenge but, as the heading showed, it was a "prediction" as to. Dowie's fate. 2. The following words which occur in this announcement are of the essence of the prophecy: "If the pretender to Elijahship shows his willingness by any direct or indirect means to enter the lists against me, he shall leave the world before my eyes with great sorrow and torment. " Thus according to the prophecy whether the challenge was accepted openly or tacitly, in either case his fate was "leaving the world with great sorrow and torment. " 3. The effect of the Promised Messiah's prayer was to be certain death for Dowie before the prophesier's eyes and calamity to his Zion, though he might try to evade the challenge. . The words of the announcement are: "Though he may try as hard as he can to fly from the death which awaits him, yet his flight from such a mighty contest will be nothing less than death to him, and calamity will certainly soon overtake his Zion. " Thus the prophecy declared that death awaited him though he might try to fly from it by not accepting the challenge openly. as 4. The Promised Messiah did not wait for a reply but addressed a prayer to God and implored Divine judgment to show the imposture of Dowie. . Before his announcement was published, the previous challenge had already raised a question in the American press as to what reply Dowie had given. Referring to such questions and probably also to the later announcement Dowie wrote on the 26th September 1903 in his Leaves of Healing: "People sometimes say to me, why do you not reply to this, that or the other thing? Reply! Do you think that I shall reply to these gnats and flies?. If I put my foot on them, I would crush out their lives. I give them a chance to fly away and live. ". About the same time he in his vituperative manner referred to the Promised Messiah as the "foolish. Muhammadan Messiah. " On December 12th, 1903, he wrote: If I am not God's Prophet, there is none on God's earth that is," and still persisting in his prophecy of the destruction of Muhammadans, he wrote in January next: "My part is to bring out the as