the Qur'an has been their safeguard, their 'trusty keeper.' Thus Muslims who make rash statements on this subject not only show great ignorance of the Qur'an itself, but treat it with the utmost disrespect when they thus impute failure to it in this most important duty which it claims to fulfil.

If then the Scriptures have been corrupted the Qur'an has failed of its purpose and has not been their safeguard. The fact is, that Muhammad had no real doubt about the authenticity and genuineness of the Scriptures, but now that he had no further use for the Jews it was necessary to discredit them and to show that they were not worthy of credit.¹ It is instructive to note that all these passages about the perversion of the meaning of the Bible and the charge of concealing its predictions were revealed at Madina.

The Jews having been thus rebuked and set aside as no longer likely to be useful or necessary, there was no object whatever in assimilating the customs and practices of Islam to those of Judaism; so the Qibla (i.e., the direction towards which the prayers should be said) was now changed back again ² from

Jerusalem to Mecca and, as usual, a revelation came to authorize the change.

It is immediately preceded by a long passage in the second Sura to show that the Ka'ba and the religion of Abraham, of which Islam is declared to be the revival, is better than the Qibla of the Jews and Judaism. The Christians, too, have a hint given them in the expression, 'The baptism of God have we received,' ¹ that in the reception of Islam consists the true regeneration of man. Then the