The Descent of the Messiah — Page 64
THE DESCENT OF THE MESSIAH they were stolen from the verses of other poets. In short, neither the Books of God nor the books of man have escaped the charge of plagiarism. The question that now remains is whether these accusations are, in fact, true? The answer is that it is plain dishonesty and the work of the damned to create doubts regarding those who receive revelations from God, as there is no issue for God to vouchsafe certain passages or sentences from certain books to those whom He blesses with His revelation. In fact, this has always been His practice. As to the fact that the same criticism can be levelled at the works of other poets and writers that some of their passages and couplets are found in other people's writings, either word for word or with some alteration—the answer, based on genuine ex- perience, is that this cannot be attributed to anything other than coincidence. It would be unfair to discount the demonstrated ability of those who have produced thousands of eloquent pieces just because a few of their sentences happen to coincide with or resemble those written by others. In the same way, these people should consider in all fairness that so far I have written and published some twenty-two books in eloquent and elegant Arabic as a challenge, not to mention my Arabic announcements. The names of these books are: At-Tabligh, Nūrul-Haqq Part I, Nūrul-Haqq Part II, Itmāmul-Hujjah, Khut- bah Ilhamiyyah, Al-Hudā, I'jāzul-Masīḥ, Karāmātuș-Sādiqin, Sirrul-Khilafah, Anjām-e-Atham, Najmul-Hudā, Mina- nur-Rahman, Hamāmatul-Bushrā, Tuhfa-e-Baghdad, Al-Balāgh, Targhībul-Mu'minin, Lujjatun-Nūr. How can anyone write so many books in Arabic that con- 1 The Arabic book Haqiqatul-Mahdi, At-Taūn, Al-Qașaid, the Qasidah in this book, a book in Arabic in the form of a letter including an Urdu Poem regarding the forbidding of Jihad, dated 7 June 1900 [are in addition to these]. (Author) 64