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THE MOHAMMEDAN CONTROVERSY
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be rejected; consequently its existence in our Scriptures would simply prove
their corruption, not the truth of the doctrine. Our opponent being determined
to resist the utmost amount of evidence, it was needless for him to have
advanced further. With a mind so bent against the reception of evidence, what
advantage could be anticipated from discussion?
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To the argument that our reason is feeble, and that a thousand things about us
are as incomprehensible as the Divine mystery, he replies, that these things
are involved in creation, and are therefore nothing to the point. Every
thing that we, can think of, he divides into three classes:1 (1)
the absolute, whose existence is beyond change or question; (2) the impossible,
whose existence cannot be conceived ; and (3) the possible, of which
the existence and non-existence are both imaginable. The mysteries of nature
belong to the third class, and, liable to change and composition, cannot be
regarded as analogies of the Divine nature; but real trinity in unity
is included in the second category, and, therefore, the mysteries of nature,
however incomprehensible, cannot affect its impossibility. He thus asserts
that the doctrine in dispute is not incomprehensible, but impossible; and he
accuses Pfander of confounding that which it is impossible to comprehend with
what we comprehend to be impossible. Thus, by begging the question, he renders
his reasoning inconclusive.
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The Maulavi feigns surprise that Pfander, having once renounced reason, should
again at pleasure use it to his service. Reason, he pretends, is abjured by us
only for the occasion; in one sense, indeed, we do reject our own reason, by
taking up with that of the devil! He taunts his opponent: "At times
affecting the extreme of piety, you abandon your reason and follow only the
Word; at others, you hold the most extravagant absurdities, fabricated out
of your own head, and even in opposition to the Scripture!" Thus he takes
Pfander to task for speaking of the planets as hung in the air; assuming from
the Old Testament the creation of a material Heavens, he accuses his adversary
of substituting in their stead an empty space on the hypothesis of our
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