n Europe would be rankest blasphemy; the intention must
decide the innocence or the offence. Hakim Singh "professed to work
miracles, preached pure morality, but also venerated the cow,"--strange
chequer of Hindu and Christian ideas.[101] The second case is the better
known one of Mirz[=a] Ghol[=a]m Ahmad, of Q[=a]di[=a]n, who sets up a
claim to be "the Similitude of the Messiah" and "the Messiah of the
Twentieth Century." As his name shows, he is a Mahomedan, but the
assumption of the name "Messiah" also shows that it is in Christ's place
he declares himself to stand. At the same time, his appeal is to his
fellow-Mahomedans; for he explains that as Jesus was the Messiah of
Moses, he himself is the Messiah of Mahomed. His superiority to Christ,
he expressly declares. "I shall be guilty of concealing the truth," he
says in his English monthly, the _Review of Religions_, of May 1902, "if
I do not assert that the prophecies which God Almighty has granted me
are of a far better quality in clearness, force, and truth than the
ambiguous predictions of Jesus.... But notwithstanding all this
superiority, I cannot assert Divinity or Sonship of God." He claims "to
have been sent by God to reform the true religion of God, now corrupted
by Jews, Christians, and Mahomedans." Doubly blasphemous as his claims
sound in the ears of orthodox Mahomedans, who reckon both Christ and
Mahomed as prophets, his sect is now estimated to number at least
10,000, including many educated Mahomedans. Whatever its fate--a mere
comet or a new planet in the Indian sky--it indicates the religious
stirring of educated India in another province, and the prominence of
Christ's personality therein. Mirz[=a] Ghol[=a]m Ahmad himself
recommends the reading of the Gospels. As to Christ's death, Mirz[=a]
Ghol[=a]m Ahmad has a theory of his own. The Koran declares, according
to Mahomedan expositors, that it was not Christ who suffered on the
cross, but another in His likeness. Mirz[=a] Ghol[=a]m Ahmad teaches
that Jesus was crucified but did not die, that He was restored to life
by His disciples and sent out of the country, whence He travelled East
until He reached Thibet, eventually arriving at Cashmere, where He died,
His tomb being located in the city of Srinagar.[102] According to the
latest report of this reincarnation, he now claims to be at once Krishna
come again for Hindus, Mahomed for Mahomedans, and Christ for
Christians.

[Sidenote: Chet Ram claimed to