1811, September 12 to 15. (Sunday.)—Finished what I had to say on the evidences of religion, and translated it into Persian. Aga Akbar sent me his treatise by one of his disciples. Aga Baba, his brother, but a very different person from him, called; he spoke without disguise of his dislike to Mohammedanism and good-will to Christianity. For his attachment to Mirza Abel, Kasim, his brother, sets him down as an infidel. Mirza Ibrahim is still in doubt, and thinks that he may be a Christian, and be saved without renouncing Mohammedanism; asks his nephew what is requisite to observe; he said, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. ‘Well,’ said he, ‘what harm is there in doing that?’ At another time Seyd Ali asked me, after a dispute, whether I would baptize any one who did not believe in the Divinity of Christ? I said, No. While translating Acts ii. and iii., especially where it is said all who believed had one heart and one mind, and had all things in common, he was much affected, and contrasted the beginning of Christianity with that of Mohammedanism, where they began their career with murdering men and robbing caravans; and oh, said he, ‘that I were sure the Holy Spirit would be given to me! I would become a Christian at once.’ Alas! both his faith and mine are very weak. Even if he were to desire baptism I should tremble to give it. He spake in a very pleasing way on other parts of the Gospel, and seems to have been particularly taken with the idea of a new birth. The state of a new-born child gives him the most striking view of that simplicity which he considers as the height of wisdom. Simplicity is that to which he aspires, he says, above all things. He was once proud of his knowledge, and vain of his superiority to others, but he found that fancied knowledge set him at a greater distance from happiness than anything else.
Martyn’s first reply in Persian to Mirza Ibrahim thus begins: ‘The Christian Minister thanks the celebrated Professor of Islamism for the favour he has done him in writing an answer to his inquiries, but confesses that, after reading it, a few doubts occurred to him, on account of which, and not for the mere purpose of dispute, he has taken upon himself to write the following pages.’ The reply is signed, ‘The Christian Minister, Henry Martyn.’ One Mirza Mahommed Ruza published in 1813, the year after Martyn’s death, a very prolix rejoinder. It is unworthy of lengthened notice, according to Sir William Muir, who thus summarises and comments on the defence made by the Christian scholar:
Henry Martyn’s first tract refers chiefly to the subject of miracles: he asserts that, to be conclusive, a miracle must exceed universal experience; that the testimony and opinion of the Arabs is therefore insufficient, besides being that of a party concerned; that, were the Koran allowed to be inimitable, that would not prove it to be a miracle; and that its being an intellectual miracle is not a virtue, but, by making it generally inappreciable, a defect. He concludes by denying the proof of Mohammed’s other miracles, in which two requisites are wanting: viz., their being recorded at or near the time of their occurrence, and the narrators being under no constraint.
The second tract directly attacks Mohammed’s mission, by alleging the debasing nature of some of the contents and precepts of the Koran, holds good works and repentance to be insufficient for salvation, and opens the subject of the true atonement as prefigured in types, fulfilled in Christ, and made public by the spread of Christianity which is mentioned as itself a convincing miracle.
The last tract commences with an attack on the absurdities of Soofi-ism, and proceeds to show that the love of God and union with Him cannot be obtained by contemplation, but only by a practical manifestation of His goodness towards us, accompanied by an assurance of our safety; and that this is fulfilled in Christianity not by the amalgamation of the soul with the Deity, but by the pouring out of God’s Spirit upon His children, and by the obedience and atonement of Christ. Vicarious suffering is then defended by analogy, the truth of the Mosaic and Christian miracles is upheld, and the whole argument closes with proving the authenticity of the Christian annals by their coincidence with profane history.
Sir William Muir agrees in the opinion of Professor Lee that, situated as Mr. Martyn was in Persia, with a short tract on the Mohammedan religion before him, and his health precarious, the course which he took was perhaps the only one practicable. Sir William adds: ‘In pursuing his argument Henry Martyn has displayed great wisdom and skill, and his reasoning appears to be in general perfectly conclusive; in a few instances, however, he has perhaps not taken up the most advantageous ground.’
The appeal of the Christian defender of the faith, at the close of his second part, on the incarnation and atonement, is marked by a loving courtesy:[61]
It is now the prayer of the humble Henry Martyn that these things may be considered with impartiality. If they become the means of procuring conviction, let not the fear of death or punishment operate for a moment to the contrary, but let this conviction have its legitimate effect; for the world, we know, passes away like the wind of the desert. But if what has here been stated do not produce conviction, my prayer is that God Himself may instruct you; that as hitherto ye have held what you believed to be the truth, ye may now become teachers of that which is really so; and that He may grant you to be the means of bringing others to the knowledge of the same, through Jesus Christ, who has loved us and washed us in His own blood, to whom be the power and the glory for ever and ever. Amen.
1811, July 26.—Mirza Ibrahim declared publicly before all his disciples, ‘that if I really confuted his arguments, he should be bound in conscience to become a Christian.’ Alas! from such a declaration I have little hope. His general good character for uprightness and unbounded kindness to the poor would be a much stronger reason with me for believing that he may perhaps be a Cornelius.
August 2.—Much against his will Mirza Ibrahim was obliged to go to his brother, who is governor of some town thirty-eight parasangs off. To the last moment he continued talking with his nephew on the subject of his book, and begged that, in case of his detention, my reply might be sent to him.