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Februray 2014
Editors:
Shahid Aziz
Mustaq Ali
Contents: Page
The Call of the Messiah 1
Hudaibiyah 4
The Virgin Birth: an Ancient Fable by Hazrat Dr Basharat Ahmad 6
م می
حالر
ن
م
ح اہلل الر
م س
ب
The Call of the Messiah
by Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, the Promised Messiah and Mahdi
Four ways and means
For a complete conviction and perfect satisfac-
tion in this matter there are, in the opinion of
the people of Truth, four ways and means:
(1) the clear, decisive statements in the
Book of God or reliable and authentic traditions
of the Holy Prophet communicating explicitly
the signs of the Promised Man as well as the
time of his advent, and also settling and decid-
ing the dispute over the death or otherwise, of
the prophet Jesus the Messiah;
(2) rational arguments and observations
derived from the senses, based on true and
sound knowledge, from which there is no run-
ning away or any way of escape;
(3) those heavenly testimonies and proofs
that have come to pass in the form of signs and
wonders for the sake of the true claimant in an-
swer to his prayer, so that the seal of a living,
heavenly verification is set on his truthfulness;
(4) the evidence tendered by saints and
righteous persons, after receiving Divine revela-
tion, at a time when there was neither sign nor
trace of the claimant, because such evidence,
being news of the unseen, is also a sign from
God Most High.
It is indeed the favour and grace of God
Most High that all the four ways and means of
inducing complete conviction and perfect satis-
faction have been brought together to bear
upon this case, and yet, despite that fact, our
internal opponents would give it no heed. In
the pages that follow, we are writing down and
discussing these four ways and means of induc-
ing conviction, and are drawing towards it the
attention of seekers after truth that they may
question and interrogate these opponents as to
why they should turn away from and denounce
these clear arguments. Was it not necessary
and essential that they should have benefitted
from them? It is, of course, patently obvious
that the matter that has actually come to pass
February
2014
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2
February 2014
has reached the stage of certainty, whereas that
which has not come to pass is as yet in a state of
vagueness and obscurity and it is not known in
what way will it come to pass, whether in the
observable, literal manner or metaphorically,
because there are both possibilities within
prophecies. But the portion that has actually
come to pass and reached the stage of certainty
demands and requires that those matters that
stand against it should be taken in a metaphori-
cal sense, so that there may not be any contra-
diction or inconsistency in the prophecies of
God Most High. These arguments are as follows.
The death of Jesus
For the careful consideration of seekers after
truth, I adduce this point in the first place, that
the death of the prophet Jesus stands clearly
established and proved from the Holy Quran.
The sacred verse has decided beyond فلما توفیتنی
doubt that whatever corruption and vitiation
has crept into the Christian doctrine has hap-
pened after the death of Jesus; and if you should
profess and allow that Jesus is still alive and is
not dead then you will also have to admit that
the Christians have not as yet tainted and cor-
rupted their belief, for it has been clearly stated
in the verse that the perversion of Christian doc-
trine will take place after the death of Jesus. As
to the meaning of the term tawaffa, توفی, it has
been definitely decided in Bukhari that its true
significance is to cause to die, as given by Ibn
Abbas (may God be pleased with him), which
has been further corroborated in Bukhari by the
hadith: الح Now anyone seeking to be . کماقال العبد الص
satisfied is easily able to understand that in the
Holy Quran and in that book that is the most
correct and reliable of all books after the Book
of God it has been clearly stated that Jesus is
dead; and this evidence has been adduced not
only by lmam Bukhari but also by Imam lbn
Ha zam and Imam Malik (may God be pleased
with all of them). Their belief that Jesus is dead
is effectively the belief of all the great divines of
the ummah, for no opposition to this belief has
been reported, and if the distinguished divines
of that age had taken exception to this belief
then that would have certainly mentioned in
some book.
It should be remembered that our claim has
as its basis the fact of the death of Jesus Christ,
and how firm and unshakable this foundation is
can be appreciated from the fact that its correct-
ness has been vouched for and verified by the
Word of God, the hadith of the Holy Prophet, the
statement of Hazrat Ibn Abbas, the evidence of
the distinguished divines of Islam and according
to all testimony of human intellect and reason.
Now the same evidence is furnished by the story
of the second coming of the prophet Elias,
which, as interpreted by Jesus himself, implied
that by Elias was meant John the Baptist
(Yahya). This interpretation, as a matter of fact,
demolished the Jewish teaching that the same
prophet Elias who had passed away from this
world would return to this earth a second time.
Seekers after truth should give serious thought
and consideration to the fact that the true and
correct belief as evinced by the clear and deci-
sive statements of the Holy Quran and the Tradi-
tions of the Holy Prophet, the evidence of the
Februray 2014
3
secondly, to take the soul for a short time and then
return it to the body again, and the latter taking of
the soul relates to the state of sleep and is suitably
applied to a person when his soul is taken by God
in sleep, just as is done to all of us every night; our
body remains lying on a bed or a mat while our
soul is taken by God for the whole night or for any
period of time He chooses. During that time, the
exercise of our free will, in the matter of the soul’s
actions, becomes inactive and inert. When the
night or whatever period He chooses is over, the
soul is again returned to the body; that is to say, we
die at night and are brought to life in the morning.
This is an explicit example of the taking of the soul
during sleep, a circumstance that we all observe
and behold every day. But we, as well as our oppo-
nents, know full well that when our soul is taken at
night, God carries it away wherever He likes, while
our body does not move even an inch from its
place. Can we say and affirm that during sleep our
body goes up into heaven, or moves even a little
from its resting place?
Certainly not. In
short, it has been very
clearly determined
that the meaning of
tawaffa is to take the
soul, be it for a short
time in sleep, or in the
state of death up to the Day of Resurrection.
An objection
It may be recalled here that in Barahin-i Ahmadi-
yya I have, at one place, written by mistake that the
meaning of tawaffa is to give in full measure,
which some maulvis adduce by way of objection.
But this is no basis for an objection. I admit that it
was a mistake on my part, but not that there is any
error in revelation. I am a human being with those
shortcomings of human nature found in all human
beings, for example, committing any number of
errors and omissions. Although I know that God
Most High will not suffer me to remain in any given
error I do not, even so, claim that I am incapable of
making a mistake in my ijtihad. Its foundation is
the Divine word alone, which is above and beyond
error, whereas the word of man is not; to forget
and err is human and unavoidable. In Barahin-i
Ahmadiyya I had also professed the doctrine that
Jesus the Messiah (peace be on him) would return
ancient scriptures and the great divines, and in
addition, the arguments offered by human reason
and intellect, is undoubtedly that Jesus the Mes-
siah is dead, and that the expectation that he will
return to this earth is very like the expectation that
caused the Jews to deny the prophethood of Jesus.
We place this dispute before impartial judges, ask-
ing whether there be any flaw or fallacy in the pro-
nouncement of this decision?
The term tawaffa (توفی)
It is borne out by the entire Quran that the term
tawaffa signifies the taking into possession by God
Most High of the human soul, not the human body,
and this can, of course, be accomplished in two
ways, either through sleep – in which case the soul
is restored to the body again – or in the case of
death; these are the only two conditions men-
tioned in the Holy Quran. But the taking into pos-
session of the human body, has nowhere been
mentioned, neither
has any lexicologist
written that the
meaning of tawaffa is
the taking into pos-
session of a body by
God Most High;
rather, all the lexi-
cologists are unanimous that when, for instance, it
is said that زیدکم this will mean nothing else توفی للاہ
but that God has taken Zaid’s soul into His posses-
sion. Of course, in the Holy Quran, the term has
been used in both senses: either God takes one’s
soul in sleep, leaving the body lying on the bed,
and then places it back in the body again or else, in
the case of death, He takes it for ever and does not
restore it till the Day of Resurrection. But the ac-
tion of taking into possession will always relate to
the soul, and not to the body.
There is yet another mistake often made by the
Ulema who oppose us. They contend that the term
tawaffa also means sleep. God be merciful unto
their condition. They should know that tawaffa
never means sleep, nor has it ever been used to
denote sleep, not in the Holy Quran, nor in any
lexicographical work, nor in the books of Hadith.
The term tawaffa, as I have just stated above, has
only two meanings: firstly, to take the soul for all
time to come, this significance relating to death;
4
February 2014
to this earth for a second visit. But it was again a
mistake, which was inconsistent with the Divine
revelation – recorded in the very same Barahin-i
Ahmadiyya – in which God Most High had con-
ferred on me the name Jesus, stating that I was
the person in whom the Quranic prophecy relat-
ing specially to Jesus the Messiah was to be ful-
filled, and endowed me with all the attributes of
the Promised Messiah. It was, therefore, God’s
will and wisdom that, notwithstanding all this
clarification by revelation, I was not to be
in formed of the intention of these communica-
tions and wrote in Barahin-i Ahmadiyya such
doctrines as were inconsistent with them. This
writing, however, obtains for me an honourable
acquittal, because if those revelations, recorded
in Barahin-i Ahmadiyya, in which I had been
categorically called the Promised Messiah had
been my own fabrication, I would not have gone
against these revelations in my statement;
rather, I would have set forth there and then my
claim that I was the Promised Messiah. But it is
obvious that my own belief which I had written
in Barahin-i Ahmadiyya militated against the
intention of the revelations recorded in Barahin-
i Ahmadiyya, from which fact any sane and
sen sible person can readily understand that
those revelations are absolutely pure and free
from any plan or fabrication on my part. It
should also be remembered that it is not within
the power and capability of a man that he may,
twelve years before a claim, write down a
reve lation and lay the foundation of that claim
and later on, after many years have passed, put
forth a claim the foundation of which had been
laid a long time ago. Such a subtle stratagem
cannot be devised by a man, nor will God Most
High give him so long a time for the propagation
of his forgeries.
Hudaibiyah: a Grand Victory
(From Nur-i-Islam, December 2013)
The name Hudaibiyah denotes a grand victory
for the Muslim nation. Though the Muslims in 6
AH (which corresponds to 628 AD) were by no
means strong militarily, morale remained high
at Hudaibiya. It had been six years since the
Prophet Muhammad, peace on him, and his sup-
porters had left Makkah. The pagans of Makkah
had tried to crush the rising power of Islam and
attacked Muslims at Madinah three times, first
at the battle of Badr, then at the battle of Uhud
and finally at the battle of Khandaq. The Mus-
lims were not strong enough to launch a coun-
terattack on such a large force at Makkah.
The Prophet, peace on him, would declare
his plan to visit Makkah to perform the Umrah
later that year. A large caravan of 1,400 pilgrims
and 70 sacrificial camels consequently headed
for Makkah. The leaders of Quraish at Makkah
were alarmed at this congregation, and despite
the fact that Makkans were bound to allow any
unarmed pilgrims to perform Umrah; they pre-
vented the Muslims from entering the city and
sent their commander Khalid bin Walid with
200 fighters to stop them. Prophet Muhammad,
peace on him, changed his route to avoid con-
frontation and traveled to a lesser known place
called Hudaibiya on the western edge of the
Harem territory. A battle was out of question as
it was a sacred month and they were already in a
state of consecration called ihram.
From there, the Prophet, peace on him, then
sent a message to the leadership of Makkah but
they mistreated the emissary. Hulais bin
Alqama, the chief of Ahabeesh, visited the Mus-
lim camp
and ad-
vised the
M a k k a n
tribe of
Q u r a i s h
that there
was noth-
ing to fear
but his ad-
vice was
i g n o r e d .
S u b s e -
q u e n t l y ,
they sent
Urwah bin
Massoud to
n e g o t i a t e ,
who then re-
layed that “I have visited the royal courts of Em-
perors Caesar, Kisra and Najashi (the Persian,
Roman and Ethiopian courts) but I have never
Lake Saif-ul-Mulk, Pakistan
Februray 2014
5
witnessed such respect and high esteem from
followers like those of Muhammad. They have
come purely for worship.” Still, the Makkan lead-
ers were bent on preventing the Muslims from
entering. As a last resort, the Prophet, peace on
him, sent Uthman bin Affan, who was well-
connected in Makkah, but he was detained and a
rumour was spread that Uthman had been
killed. Though 400km away from his city and
possessing no proper arms to fight, the Prophet,
peace on him, called on his followers to prepare
for war. People rushed to pledge allegiance to
the Prophet and the Makkans were soon in-
formed that 1,400 volunteers were ready to fight
alongside him. Fearing them, the Makkans
agreed to discuss new terms of peace with him.
The Makkans released Uthman bin Affan and
sent Suhail bin Amr Al-Thaqafi to negotiate the
terms of a peace treaty. Though tough in his
dealings, Al-Thaqafi later embraced Islam at
their return to Makkah.
Terms were agreed and documented, includ-
ing an armistice between the two parties for the
following ten years and the liberty for any per-
son to join the opposing side if they so wished.
In addition, they had stipulated that a Makkan
travelling to Madinah
would be sent back to
Makkah but that mi-
grants from Madinah
would be allowed into
Makkah to join Quraish.
This depicted the
Prophet’s absolute tol-
erance to those reject-
ing his teachings and
his support for free-
dom of choice (even where sending back con-
verts to Makkah was concerned, the Prophet had
accepted this on the basis that the convert
would attempt to spread Islam within his tribe).
Furthermore, a minor whose father is still
alive would not be able to join Muhammad with-
out the consent of his guardian but that anyone
from Madinah who joins the Quraish tribe
would not be sent back. Finally, they had agreed
that the Muslims would return to Madinah with-
out entering Makkah but that they would enter
Makkah the following year and perform the Um-
rah ritual for a period of 3 days.
The Makkans attempted to deliberately pro-
voke the Prophet through rigorous terms, but
the Prophet accepted the terms in spite of that
in order to maintain peace and stability. This
treaty, known as the Treaty of Hudaibiya, proved
to be a turning point in the history of Islam.
Very few people could visualize the long-
term benefits of the treaty. The first advantage
of the treaty was that a hostile Makkan leader-
ship recognized the Prophet Muhammad, peace
on him, as the head of state at Madinah. Sec-
ondly, the treaty curtailed the hostile behaviour
of the Quraish against Muslims. They were now
allowed to move freely and talk openly about
Islam. Third, Muslims were allowed to make alli-
ances with other tribes. Finally, the 10-year ar-
mistice with Quraish provided Muslims with a
unique opportunity to preach Islam and to deal
with their rivals in other parts of the peninsula.
They would consequently go on to conquer the
Jewish stronghold of Khyber and the tribe of
Quraish could do nothing to stop this acquisi-
tion.
Following the peaceful armistice at Hudai-
biya, Islam increased by leaps and bounds.
Quraish had lost
three battles
against the Mus-
lims and people
were now begin-
ning to foresee the
eventual triumph of
Islam. Thus began
the conversion to
Islam in the thou-
sands. The Prophet,
peace on him, entered Makkah the following
year with 2,000 pilgrims alongside him, an in-
crease of 600 from the previous year. The treaty
is referred to in the 48th, stipulating that
“converts to Islam be returned to Makkah” be
abrogated, as runaways did not emigrate to
Madinah, knowing they would be returned, but
instead hid at the Red Sea coast and fought the
trade caravans of Quraish as they passed.
The treaty at Hudaibiya proved to be a
prel ude to the conquest of Makkah. As per the
6
February 2014
agreement, the tribe of Banu Bakr joined forces
with Quraish and Banu Khuza‘a entered into
alliance with the Prophet, peace on him. Owing
to a long history of enmity between the two
tribes, Banu Bakr attacked Banu Khuza‘a just 20
months later in the 8th manpower and arms.
Amr bin Salem of Banu Khuza‘a, along with
twenty men, rushed to Madinah and told the
Prophet of the situation on the ground. He con-
sequently sent word to Quraish to pay blood
money for those killed and terminate their alli-
ance with the Banu Bakr tribe or consider the
Hudaibiya treaty void. Quraish refused to pay or
break their alliance with Banu Bakr and voiced
their approval to nullify the terms of the treaty.
Wishing to avoid bloodshed, the Prophet, peace
on him, would devise a secret strategy to sur-
round Makkah with a large force so that Mak-
kans could surrender without a fight. Indeed,
the Prophet had declared his preparation for
war without specifying a location.
The Muslim tribes rushed to Madinah in the
month of Ramadan on the 8th; tribes had en-
tered the fold of Islam in these 20 months fol-
lowing the conquest of Khyber and Taima. Mus-
lim volunteers came in the thousands. The fa-
mous tribes of Aslam, Sulaim, Ghifar, Muzaina,
Ashjaa and Juhaina joined the Islamic forces.
Muslim forces marched towards Makkah and
camped at Marr Zahran. They then surrounded
the holy city. The Quraish were perplexed by
this sudden attack. The Muslims had also sealed
all possible routes of escape. The Prophet, peace
on him, had declared a general amnesty and the
entire city surrendered to him on the 10th.
It is of great significance that the arch-
enemies of Islam grasped the situation and em-
braced Islam after the Hudaibiya treaty and
prior to the conquest of Makkah. These included
Abbas bin Abdul Muttalib, the Prophet’s uncle,
Abu Sufyaan of Quraish, Khalid bin Walid and
Amr bin Al-Aas, the would-be conqueror of
Egypt. Later, Ikrimah bin Abu Jahl, Uteba bin Abi
Lahab, Safwan bin Umayyah, Kaab bin Zuhair,
Suhail bin Amr, Hakim bin Hizam and Hindah
bint Rabeeah embraced Islam. Practically, there
remained virtually no enemies to Islam in Mak-
kah. The Makkan leadership, which had previ-
ously banned his entry to the city on the 6th,
highlighting the great
achievement of the
Hudaibiya treaty.
The Prophet Mu-
hammad, peace on
him, had thus
achieved his divine
mission. While he em-
braced slaves such as
Bilal bin Rabah, Zaid
bin Haritha and
Wahshi, he was also
able to cultivate the
ruling elite. He ad-
dressed nine impor-
tant letters to the rul-
ers of leading empires and prominent kingdoms
including King Najashi, ruler of Abyssinia, Emperor
Heraclius of Rome, Emperor Chosroes of Persia,
King Makawkas of Egypt, Hauza bin Ali, the ruler of
Yamamah in Yemen, the ruler of Busra in Jordan,
Harith bin Shammar, ruler of Damascus, Manzar bin
Sawi, ruler of Bahrain and Jeefar, ruler of Oman.
All these letters were received with great ova-
tion except for the Persian emperor, who is said to
have torn it up. The empire itself disintegrated
when the emperor was killed by his own son as
predicted by the Prophet Muhammad, peace on
him.
Such was the significance of the events that
took place at Hudaibiya near Makkah. People were
to visit this historical place and a mosque was to be
erected at the place where the Prophet offered
prayers during his stay. This mosque, near Shu-
maisi, lies about 20km away from Makkah on the
old road leading up to Jeddah.
The Virgin Birth: an Ancient Fable
by Hazrat Dr Basharat Ahmad
In the preceding pages I have shown, from the
evangelic record itself, that the virgin-birth idea
had no existence in the lifetime of Jesus nor in the
time of the Gospel writers. The story was coined at
a much later period and incorporated in the Gospel.
“There were good reasons,” as I have already stated,
“to clothe Jesus with the halo of a virgin birth and
make of him a son-God – weighty reasons of State.”
Februray 2014
7
These reasons I wish to
disclose in this chapter.
To properly under-
stand the fabrication of
this virgin-birth story
with regard to Jesus, it is
necessary to know the
whole chain of which it
formed just one link.
There was, in the first
place, nothing new in it. It
had come down from
time immemorial and
was prevalent amongst
many an ancient sun-worshipping people who
looked upon their gods as the incarnations of
the sun. Apollo and Dionysus, two Greek gods,
were supposed to be sun-incarnates. And so was
Hercules among the Romans, Mithra, among the
Persians, Adonis among the Syrians, Osiris, Isis
and Horus in Egypt and Baal and Astarte in Ba-
bel. They were all sun gods and according to an
eminent authority, Dr Carpenter, they had the
following features common to them all:
Every one of these sun gods was born on or
about 25 December, the day of the Christian fes-
tival of Christmas.
Every one was born of a virgin.
Every one was born in a cave or some un-
derground chamber.
Every one lived a life of suffering for man-
kind.
Every one was called by such epithets as
intercessor, salvation-giver, healer and light.
Every one was overpowered in this life by
the forces of Darkness.
Every one went underground where Hell is.
Every one rose again from the dead, went up
to Heaven and was worshipped by the people.
Every one founded a school of saints and a
church in which people were baptised and ad-
mitted as disciples.
Every one has his memory commemorated
through the Lord’s Supper.
A glance of comparison will show that the
present-day church scheme of dogma and ritual
is an imitation of the old sun-worshipping cults.
Every one of these mythological touches has
been added to the por-
trait of Jesus. It is obvi-
ous on the face of it
that the Israelite
prophet Jesus, the son
of a humble village
carpenter, has been
made to sit on one of
these ancient pedes-
tals of sun gods with
all the paraphernalia
of the ancient super-
stitious beliefs at-
tached to him. And
among other things, it was necessary to give him
a virgin birth too, which was done.
It was in the time of the Roman Emperor
Constantine that Jesus underwent all this meta-
morphosis and from a poor mortal became a
son of God. There is evidence strong enough to
throw light on this. The idea springs into being
at the time when the Bible was rendered into
Greek. Before that, there is no trace of it. As al-
ready shown, the whole story is based on the
prophecy in Isaiah: “Behold a virgin shall con-
ceive and bear a son and shall call his name Im-
manuel” (7: 14).
Now, higher criticism has made a revelation
with regard to this prophecy that knocks the
whole bottom out of the virgin story. Such an
eminent authority as Dr Davidson’s research on
the point has come to the conclusion that the
word ‘virgin’ is a mistranslation of the Hebrew
word in the original. The original word here was
almah, which means only ‘a grown-up woman’.
In Greek it was rendered as parthenos, which
means ‘virgin’. And this, as I will just show, was
done with a purpose. It shows beyond doubt
that the virgin birth idea crept in at the time
when Christianity put on the Greek garment. A
clear text in the Hebrew original was distorted
from a ‘grown-up woman’ into a ‘virgin’. This
tampering with the Old Testament text should
suffice to explain the incorporation in Matthew
of the virgin birth account which conflicts so
manifestly with the rest of the evidence on that
point.
But the question remains: Why was all this
done? Why at all were such liberties taken with
sacred writings as to twist one word so as to
8
February 2014
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make it mean quite another? True, it was done
when Christianity embarked on its career
among the Romans of old. But why? It is not dif-
ficult to see the reason. It is a fact of history that
the Roman king, Constantine, was the one man
who, with his conversion, made Christianity
what all of a sudden it became. At a single leap it
became the state religion and the religion of a
whole people. But history also tells that this
royal convert was little enamoured of the gentle
teacher of Galilee or his teachings. He cared not
a hang what religion he should have or not have.
In his conversion, he was inspired solely by rea-
sons of state. This is admitted by orthodox
Christian critics themselves. Constantine was a
man of a despotic bent of mind and wanted to
rule as such. Such a rule, however, was impossi-
ble in the democratic atmosphere which then
prevailed in Rome. So he hit upon a stratagem.
The Roman populace was at the time divided
into two groups. There were those who were
Constantine’s equals and rivals, the people of
the aristocratic classes. They were all worship-
pers of the sun god Apollo. The others were
those who had generation after generation been
used to a life of slavery. They were almost
wholly Christians. Constantine’s ambition could
not fail to detect in this section the right sort of
material to bend to his own will and use them as
tools in his designs of despotism. To rally these
classes around him, the surest way was to em-
brace their religion – Christianity. But it was no
easy task to renounce the old, inherited and
royal religion and substitute it by another. A via
media, however, was not hard to discover. The
old cult of sun worship might be retained in
every dogma and detail, only Jesus was to be put
on the pedestal of Apollo. This was done. Both
sections of people were satisfied. The upper
classes saw no change in their customary forms
of worship except that the name of Apollo was
replaced by that of Jesus. The common slaves,
the Christians, were overjoyed that the Emperor
should embrace their faith, even though in
name. Besides, they were an ignorant people
and did not know much of their religion. The
mere fact that Jesus was now worshipped was
enough to make them devoted to Constantine’s
rule, however despotic. Thus it was that an an-
cient sun-worship cult was caught hold of and
labelled as Christianity. Jesus, consequently, was
clothed with all the paraphernalia of that cult,
including virgin-birth.
To do things thoroughly, however, it was ne-
cessary to make this borrowed cult put on bibli-
cal feathers. The Hebrew almah, a ‘grown-up
woman’, of Isaiah was therefore rendered into
Greek parthenos, ‘virgin’. And a few verses were
interpolated in the text in Matthew as regards
Jesus’ birth. Likewise in Luke, the words “as was
supposed” were added where Jesus is spoken of
as the son of Joseph. These were only so many
links in a chain forged by greed and ambition
coupled with the designs of statecraft. Jesus of
the church is only Apollo in borrowed plumes
and if today he is supposed to have been born of
a virgin and considered the son of God, it has
nothing to do with the noble soul who lived and
preached in Palestine. That true Jesus now
stands out clear, in the midst of all this mist and
myth that selfishness and superstition have
woven around him. He was a plain man, the son
of a plain village carpenter, Joseph, and a plain
noble woman, Mary.