Jesus In India — Page 67
CHAPTER ONE 57 as I bear the same feelings of love and sincerity towards Jesus, the Messiah, may peace be on him, as do the Christians; rather, I have a stronger attachment to him, for Christians do not know the man whom they praise, but I know him whom I praise, for I have as good as seen him. Therefore, I now proceed to unveil the real nature of the reports contained in the Gospels that at the time of the crucifixion all dead saints had come back to life and returned to the city. Let it, therefore, be clearly understood that accounts like these are of the nature of [visions] that were seen by some holy men after the crucifixion, in which they saw that the dead saints had been brought back to life and graced the city where they met the peo- ple. Just as dreams mentioned in divine scriptures are interpreted, for instance, Joseph's dream, this vision too had an interpretation of its own. The interpretation was that Jesus had not died on the cross and that God had rescued him. If the question is asked as to the rationale behind this interpretation, the answer is that experts in the art of interpretation testify to its validity and have borne witness to it on the basis of their experience. I quote below from T'ațīrul-Anām, a time honoured authority on the art of interpre- tation of dreams. من راي أن الموتى و ثبوا من قبورهم و رجعوا إلى دورهم فانه يطلق من في السجن See the book T'ațīrul-Anām fi Tabīril-Manām, by Qutb- uz-Zamān Sheikh Abdul Ghanī an-Nābulīsī, p. 289. Translation: If someone has a dream or a vision that the dead have come out of their graves and have made for their homes, the interpretation is that a prisoner would be released from bondage, and that he would be rescued