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