Truth About The Crucifixion — Page 180
The Statement, issued by the British Council of Churches'. Committee for Relationships With People Of Other Faiths, said:. We note that the Ahmadiyya Muslim movement in Britain has organised a conference in London from 2nd to 4th June, on the theme 'Deliverance of Jesus from the Cross'. We read that topics to be discussed, at the Conference centre round one of the principal tenets of the 89-year-old Ahmadiyya Movement, that Jesus was taken down from the Cross by his disciples, and after recovering from his wounds travelled secretly to Iran, Afghanistan and. Kashmir, eventually dying a natural death in Kashmir, and being buried in a tomb still to be found in Srinagar today. We recall that the Ahmadiyya Movement came into existence in the closing decades of the nineteenth century, in the Eastern Punjab region of the Indian sub-continent, and that the movement began as a result of the preaching and activities of Mirza Ghulam. Ahmad. . We are reluctant to make any public comment on the London conference. Orthodox Islamic authorities have for a long time repudiated as non-Quranic the Ahmadiyya claim that Jesus died a natural death after going to Kashmir: orthodox Muslims in London should therefore perhaps be the ones to do any necessary commenting on this London conference and its theme. Our reluctance also stems from our awareness that Christianity has often indulged in aggressive and negative attacks on the central tenets of other religions, attacks of a sort comparable to these Ahmadiyya attacks on the central Christian tenet: we do not wish to appear over-defensive when such attacks are directed at us. . However, in view of the publicity given to this conference in a way calculated to stir up controversy, we feel bound to make three comments: 1. We re-affirm our belief in the historicity of the crucifixion and death of Jesus which is attested by the four gospels and 186