The Descent of the Messiah — Page 178
THE DESCENT OF THE MESSIAH 7 [continued] ting of the moon. At the time, after seeing the Sign of the 1311 Hijri splitting of the moon, which was a kind of eclipse, the dis- believers had said that what makes it so remarkable? Such occurrences have occurred since ancient times and are not supernatural in nature. By presenting the same verse in this revelation, God has indicated that these people will also be shown the Sign of the eclipse, but the deniers will say exactly what Abu Jahl and others had said, i. e. , "Such phenomena have occurred since ancient times"; [ and that] you should have shown us something supernatural so that we may have believed. Consider the magnitude of this prophecy which was announced twelve years before the lunar and solar eclipses took place. Living Witnesses: The revelation on page 498 of Barahin-e-Ahmadiyya' testifies that this prophecy was made twelve years prior to the eclipses. Even though it has existed in the book Ad-Daraqutni for about a thousand years, as well as in Ikmālud-Din-a trust- ed Shiite text, for about the same amount of time, people still did not believe it. They said that the lunar eclipse should have taken place on the first night of the lunar month, i. e. , on the crescent moon; and that the solar eclipse should have occurred precisely in the middle of the month, i. e. on the fifteenth. However, it occurred the way it has occurred since time immemorial. The Hadith does not contain the word supernatural and it is on account of their own naiveté that they wrongly interpret the first night and the middle night in the literal sense. The meaning of the Hadith is self-evident. It says that the lunar eclipse will take place on the first of the nights that have been fixed for it in the laws of nature, and the solar eclipse will take place on the middle of the fixed days, i. e. the 28th, and this is how it came to be. This was a Sign appointed for the true Promised Mahdi: that when, at the time of his claim, he would be denied and in need of a Sign, the solar and lunar eclipses would take place on these exact dates in the month of Ramadan. It is obvious that lunar and solar eclipses do not often occur concurrently during Ramadan and that such a phenomenon is unlikely to occur for hundreds of years. To further specify that eclipses will take place on specific dates is also something that may occur after centuries. Now, the meaning of the Hadith is that until the Prom- 1 See Barahin-e-Ahmadiyya, Part IV, Hadrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, 2016. Islam International Publications Ltd. p. 373. [Publisher] 178