Barahin-e-Ahmadiyya Part IV — Page 225
Footnote Number Eleven 225 ibnull a h [the son of Allah], the Christians did not do anything new; rather, they only followed in the footsteps of the earlier disbelievers and polytheists. In short, at the time of Hadrat Kh a tamul-Anbiy a’ [the Seal of the Prophets], may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, the Jews were steeped in creature-worship and had deviated far from true beliefs, so much so that some of them shared with Hindus the belief in trans- migration and some were in total denial of the Judgment [Day], and some believed that requital of good or evil was limited to this life only and did not believe in the resurrection; and there were yet others who followed the footsteps of the Greeks in holding matter and souls as eternal and self-existing, while some, like atheists, considered the soul mortal. Some believed, like the philosophers, that God Almighty is neither ن ی رب العٰلم [ Rabbul-‘ a lam i n ] nor is He the Regulator by virtue of His will. In short, all of their thinking had become diseased like the body of a leper and they had ceased to believe in God Almighty’s perfect attrib- utes of rub u biyyat [providence], ra h m a niyyat [graciousness], ra hi m- iyyat [mercy], and being M a liku-Yaumid-D i n [Master of the Day of Judgment]—they neither believed that these were His exclusive attrib- utes nor that they were found in God Almighty in perfection. Rather, their beliefs were vitiated with a variety of suspicions, disbeliefs, and impurities and, having totally disfigured the teaching of the Torah, they started spreading the stench of idolatry and vice. Thus, they are the foremost of the polytheists and are their forerunners in holding God Almighty as a corporeal being with a material body and in believ- ing His rub u biyyat, ra h m a niyyat, ra hi miyyat, and other attributes to be in abeyance, and shared by other beings. Such was the condition of the Jews, but it is unfortunate that the Christians, in a very short period of time, made their own situation far worse. They did not uphold any of the above-mentioned verities and ascribed all of God’s perfect attributes to the son of Mary. The essence of their faith is that God Almighty is not the Lord of all that