Invitation to Ahmadiyyat — Page 284
284 missionaries acted as his assistants. Such a man would be expected to continue to hold fast to all his Christian beliefs. Having done so much for the publicity of Christianity and having played the role of an exponent and advocate, one would not expect that he would, even for a moment, recant his belief in the godhead of Jesus or be impressed by the miraculous power of Islam. That he would die within fifteen months would also be a grand prophecy, but considering that A tham was a sixty-five-year-old man, it could be said that he had died because he had completed the span of his life. On the other hand, consider the even more wonderful alternative that, were A tham to retreat from bigotry and hostility, he would be safe from death for fifteen months. For A tham to repent of his behaviour would be a far greater sign than for him to persist in his beliefs because it was far more difficult for him to retreat from his confirmed and settled attitude against Islam than to persist in it. While death can be brought about by human hand, a guarantee of life for fifteen months cannot be given by anybody. Therefore, in the event of the second alternative com - ing true, the prophecy would be far more grand and impressive. God, for whom nothing is impossible, chose the second alterna - tive and instilled fear in A tham’s heart. The first sign of this was that A tham stood up during that very debate, touched his ears as a sign of repentance, and swore that he had never referred to the Holy Prophet s as as the Antichrist. After the publication of the prophecy, the whole country was intrigued and waited for the outcome, but God did not make peo - ple wait for fifteen months. Right from the moment the prophecy was made, A tham’s condition changed and he stopped writing books and articles in support of Christianity. It was not a small