Hazrat Ahmad — Page 31
HADHRAT AHMAD 31 the Promised Messiah's genius or rather the Divine help which accompanied him. One day, the Christians, in order to embarrass the Promised Messiah, collected a number of maimed and blind people, and in the middle of the session presented them to him, saying that since he claimed to be the Promised Messiah, and the first Messiah (Jesus) used to cure the maimed and the blind, his claims to be the Promised Messiah could be accepted only if he would effect a similar cure. They added that there was no need for him to go far to find the sufferers since they were already at hand. . The call took the assembly by surprise and people wondered how the Promised Messiah would deal with the situation. The. Christians were elated and thought that a stunning blow had been dealt and that their opponent had suffered a severe defeat in full view of the assembly. . But when they heard the reply of the Promised Messiah their joy changed into chagrin and self-reproach, and their fancied victory was turned into an utter defeat, and everyone applauded the readiness and appropriateness of the reply. . The Promised Messiah said that the healing of such sufferers by Jesus was an assertion of the New Testament and formed no part of his own conviction or claims. In fact, for him the miracles of Jesus were susceptible of an altogether different interpretation. . It had indeed been claimed by the New Testament that Jesus used to effect the physical cure of such ailments and that simply by a touch of the hand, and not by medicine nor by prayer. At the same time it is written that if his followers have but a grain of faith they can perform more wonderful miracles than these. Therefore, it did not lie with the Christians to bring those afflicted ones to him; rather it was he who was entitled to present the sufferers to them and, therefore, with due acknowledgment of their kindness in collecting them, he now presented them to the Christians with the request that, agreeably to the statement in the New Testament, if they had in them faith as a grain of mustard seed, they should place their hands on them and command them to be whole. If they were cured, then he would be convinced that they and their faith were true. If, however, they failed and could not come up to their own pretensions, then no one could possibly believe in their truth. . The rejoinder made a great impression and the Christians were altogether dumbfounded and hastened to change the topic.