Claims and Teachings - Ahmad The Promised Messiah and Mahdi — Page 404
464 A A new year's call to Christendom. In the name of God, the Munificent;, the Generous. We praise Him and invoke His blessings upon His prophet. A Call to Truth. "Tell them that if God had begotten a son then I should have been the first to worship him. " This appeal is addressed to the ministers of the Christian Churches in all humility and respect. Truly, if Jesus Christ (peace be on him) were really the Son of God or God Himself, then I should have been the first to worship him and to proclaim his godhood in all the land. And though I might have suffered harm and met with death, or been killed or torn to pieces for his sake, still I would not have desisted from calling the people to him and proclaiming his godhood. But, my dear ones may God have mercy on you and open your eyes know you for cer- tain that Jesus (peace be on him) was not God. He was only a prophet and nothing more than a prophet. And I swear by God's Omnipotence that I bear such a true love for him as is never possible for you to experience, and the glory in which I see him, it can never be yours to discern. There is not a shade of doubt that he was one of the beloved and approved prophets of God, one of those upon whom a special blessing decends from God, one who is purified by God's own hand. But never was he a God or the Son of God. I say not this from myself, but from God, the Master of the Earth and the Heaven, who has manifested Himself to me and made me the Promised Messiah of the latter days- He has spoken to me saying that the truth is that Jesus Son of Mary was neither God nor the Son of God. He has spoken to rue saying that the prophet who caihe with the Quran and invited men to Islam was a true prophet and that it is he at