Invitation to Ahmadiyyat — Page 27
27 moment and told Hadrat Ab u Bakr ra that his interpretation of the verses was incorrect. They would have said that since Jesus had been alive in heaven for the last 600 years, it was wrong to say that all past Prophets were dead. They would also have asked why, if some of those past Prophets were still alive, could the Holy Prophet s as not have remained alive as well. (2) It proves that the Companions’ belief that all earlier Prophets had died was not just a matter of opinion, rather they considered it to have been derived from the Quran. If this were not so, any of the Companions could have stood up and said that, even though it was true that all the Prophets had died, the verses he had recited did not support this view. The fact that Ab u Bakr ra recited the verse ‘Verily, all Messengers have passed away before him’, and concluded from it that all the past Prophets were dead, and the fact that the Companions not only did not deny this but got solace from it and went about the town reciting it shows that they were all in agreement with Hadrat Ab u Bakr’s interpretation of the verse. (3) It proves that, whether or not the Companions believed in the death of other Prophets, they certainly did not believe that Jesus was still alive. It is evident from all authentic Traditions that when Hadrat ‘Umar ra was threatening to kill anyone who said that the Holy Prophet s as was dead, he cited the example of Moses who had gone up the mountain for 40 days, but he never spoke of Jesus having ascended to heaven. If the Companions had believed that Jesus was alive in Heaven, would Hadrat ‘Umar ra or his like- minded Companions not have cited that example? The fact that they cited only the example of Moses and not of Jesus proves that they did not believe Jesus to be alive. Aside from the consensus of the Companions, the family