warnings, we will not believe.'" [Qur'an 25:7.] Other Prophets,
similarly, have been subject to poverty and afflictions, to
hunger, and to the ills and chances of this world. As these holy
Persons were subject to such needs and wants, the people were,
consequently, lost in the wilds of misgivings and doubts, and were
afflicted with bewilderment and perplexity. How, they wondered,
could such a person be sent down from God, assert His ascendancy
over all the peoples and kindreds of the earth, and claim Himself
to be the goal of all creation,--even as He hath said: "But for
Thee, I would have not created all that are in heaven and on
earth,"--and yet be subject to such trivial things? You must
undoubtedly have been informed of the tribulations, the poverty,
the ills, and the degradation that have befallen every Prophet of
God and His companions. You must have heard how the heads of their
followers were sent as presents unto different cities, how
grievously they were hindered from that whereunto they were
commanded. Each and every one of them fell a prey to the hands of
the enemies of His Cause, and had to suffer whatsoever they
decreed....

... The All-Glorious hath decreed these very things, that are
contrary to the desires of wicked men, to be the touchstone and
standard whereby He proveth His servants, that the just may be
known from the wicked, and the faithful distinguished from the
infidel....

And now, concerning His words: "And He shall send His angels...."
By "angels" is meant those who, reinforced by the power of the
spirit, have consumed, with the fire of the love of God, all human
traits and limitations, and have clothed themselves with the
attributes of the most exalted Beings and of the Cherubim....

As the adherents of Jesus have never understood the hidden meaning
of these words, and as the signs which they and leaders of their
Faith have expected have failed to appear, they therefore refused
to acknowledge, even until now, the truth of those Manifestations
of Holiness that have since the days of Jesus been made manifest.
They have thus deprived themselves of the outpourings of God's
holy grace, and of the wonders of His divine utterance. Such is
their low estate in this, the Day of Resurrection! They have even
failed to perceive that were the signs of