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33

THE MOHAMMEDAN CONTROVERSY

opponents, who have hitherto treated with a smile of contempt the puny attacks made against their faith. While we write, the promised refutation of the Shiea Apologist, Maulavi Syud Ali, has issued from the press of Lucknow as a thick octavo. volume, not yet seen by us.1

A long and protracted controversy was carried on in Urdoo by Pfander with two Mohammedans, Syud Rehmat Ali and Mohammed Kâzim Ali,2 the latter being the leading writer. It began in 1842, and lasted for two or three years; there are. seven epistles, which gradually increase in length, the last containing 147 closely-written pages. The disputant sets out with the text, "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel"; and asserting that our Saviour here and elsewhere declared that His mission extended only to the Jews, challenges his opponent to prove its universality, and affects virtuous indignation at our missionaries practising so foul a deception as to attempt conversion to an obsolete religion intended only for the Jews. Pfander had here to argue at a disadvantage against the Moslem's preconceived notion that Christ's mission was; like that of other prophets, fully developed during His life; he had to concede that in one sense He was primarily sent to the Jews, and that the universality of His faith was not proclaimed till after His Ascension; still, a number of passages which clearly establish the doctrine, are quoted from our Saviour's own discourses, and the apostles' teaching is added as conclusive on the subject. Kâzim Ali's objections display the perversity and helpless blindness of the followers of Islam. To all assertions of Christ Himself made before His Ascension, he objects that they contradict the above verse, and His own directions to the Seventy. To the final command "Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations," he objects that it is immediately preceded by a clause which destroys dependence on it, namely, "but some doubted." The Apostles' declarations are treated as contradictory; and as in


1 [An account of it is given at the end of this article.]
2 These writers are, we believe, Vakeels in the civil court at Agra; Kâzim Ali seems to be possessed of some intelligence and sharpness, but his talents do not rise above mediocrity.

           

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