Life of Ahmad — Page 402
402 CHAPTER 38 LITERARY MIRACLE Ahmad’s as debate with the Christians was evidence of the fact that he was the sole champion of Islam. The way in which he advocated the cause impressed everyone. Though t he mullahs were already siding with Christians and excommunicating Ahmad as , yet inwardly they were sore vexed at the exposure of their own weakness and ignorance. To mitigate their sense of shame they declared in season and out of season that Ahmad as was an ignoramus and did not know even the Arabic language. He had already invited Muhammad Husain to test his knowledge by an open competition of a literary character, but he had evaded it with a long explanation which he published in his journal No. 8, Vol. 15, pp. 190-192. Now Ahmad as wrote within the space of about a week four exquisite Qa si d a s (639 verses) of matchless character and a masterly commentary on Al-F a ti h ah in beautiful Arabic and asked Muhammad Husain and all other mullahs to produce the like of his work entitled Kar a m a tu s Sa diq i n , printed at the Punjab Press,