In the previous discourse we perused and commented upon the marvelous vision
of the Prophet Daniel (Dan. vii.). We saw how the four beasts that represented
the four king- doms succeeding one another were the Powers of Darkness and how
they persecuted the Jews and the early Church of Jesus, which was constituted of
true believers in the One God. We also remarked that those Powers were pagan and
allegorically described as ferocious brutes. Further, we saw that the "Eleventh
Horn," which had eyes and mouth, which uttered blasphemies against the Most High
had fought and overcome His Saints had changed the times and the Law of God,
could be no other than the Emperor Constantine, who in AD. 325, promulgated his
imperial rescript proclaiming the creed and the decisions of the Nicene General
Council.

In this article let us follow our researches patiently with regard to the
glorious BAR NASHA, or the "Son-of-Man," who was presented-upon the clouds to
the Most High, to whom was given the Sultaneh (Sholtana in the original text,
i.e. "dominion" or "empire") honor and kingdom for ever, and who was
commissioned to destroy and annihilate the terrible Horn.

Now let us proceed forthwith to establish the identity of this "Bar nasha."

Before finding out who this Son-of-Man is, it is but essential that we should
take into consideration the following points and observations: –

(a) When a Hebrew Prophet predicts that "all the nations and peoples of the
earth shall serve him" (i.e. the Bar nasha) or "the people of the Saints of the
Most High," we must understand that he means thereby the nations men- tioned in
Genesis xv. 18-21, and not the English, the French, or the Chinese nations.

(b) By the phrase "the people of the Saints of the Most High" it is
understood to mean first the Jews and then the Christians who confessed the
absolute Oneness of God, fought and suffered for it until the appearance of the
Bar nasha and the destruction of the Horn.

(c) After the destruction of the Horn the people and the nations that will
have to serve the Saints of God are the Chaldeans, Medo-Persians, Greeks, and
the Romans – the four nations represented by the four beasts that had trod upon
and invaded the Holy Land.

From the Adriatic to the Walls of China all the various nations have either
as Muslims received the homage or as unbelievers served the Muslims, who are the
only true believers in the One God.

(d) It is remarkable to realize the significant fact that God often allows
the enemies of His true religion to subdue and persecute His people because of
two purposes. First, because he wants to punish His people for their lethargy,
drawbacks and sins. Secondly, because He wishes to prove the faith, the patience
and the indestructibility of His Law and Religion, and thus to allow the
infidels to continue in their unbelief and crime until their cup is full. God in
due time Himself intervenes on behalf of the believers when their very existence
is on its beam-ends. It was a terrible and most critical time for all Muslims
when the Allied Forces were in Constantinople during those awful years of the
Armistice. Great preparations were made by the Greeks and their friends to take
back the Grand Mosque of Aya Sophia; the Greek Patriarch of Constantinople went
to London carrying with him a precious ancient patriarchal cope set in gems and
pearls for the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was strenuously advocating the
restoration of Constantinople and the grand edifice of St. Sophia to the Greeks.
On the eve of the celebration of Prophet Muhammad’s night journey to Heaven –
called al-mi’raj – the sacred building was crammed with a great multitude of the
suppliant faithful who till the dawn most earnestly supplicated the Almighty
Allah to deliver Turkey, and particularly the Sacred House, from those who
"would fill it with ugly idols and images as before!" In connection with that
patriarchal mantle or cope, I wrote an article in the Turkish paper the Aqsham,
showing the existence of a schism between the Greek Orthodox and the Protestant
Anglican Churches. I pointed out that the cope was not meant as a pallium of
investiture and recognition of the Anglican orders, and that a reunion between
the two Churches could never be accomplished unless one or the other of the
parties should renounce and abjure certain articles of faith as heretical and
erroneous. I also pointed out that the cope was a diplomatic bribe on behalf of
Greece and its Church. The letter ended with these words: "All depends upon the
grace and miracle which this bakhskish of a pontifical cope is expected to
work!"

The result is too well known to be repeated here. Suffice it to say that the
Patriarch died in England, and the Almighty, who sent the Bar nasha to crush the
Horn and chase out the legions of Rome from the East, raised Mustapha Kamal, who
saved his country and restored the honor of Islam!

(e) It is to be noted that the Jews were the chosen people of God until the
advent of Jesus Christ. In the eyes of the Muslims neither the Jews nor the
Christians have a right to claim the title of "the People of the Saints of the
Most High," because the former reject Jesus altogether, while the latter insult
him by deifying him. Moreover, both are equally unworthy of that title because
of their refusing to recognize the Last Prophet who has completed the list of
the Prophets.

We shall now proceed to prove that the Bar nasha – the Son-of-Man – who was
presented to the "Ancient of Days" and invested with power to kill the monster,
was no other than Prophet Muhammad, whose very name literally means "the Praised
and Illustrious." Whatever other person you may try to invent in order to
deprive the august Messenger of Allah of this unique glory and majesty bestowed
on him in the Divine Court, you will only make yourselves ridiculous; and this
for the following reasons: –

1. We know that neither Judaism nor Christianity has any particular name for
its faith and its system. That is to say, neither the Jews nor the Christians
have any special name for the doctrines and forms of their faith and worship.
"Judaism" and "Christianity" are not Scriptural nor authoriz- ed either by God
or the founders of those religions. In fact, a religion, if true, cannot
properly be named after its second founder, for the real author and founder of a
true religion is God, and not a Prophet. Now the proper noun for the laws,
doctrines, forms and practices of worship as revealed by Allah to Prophet
Muhammad is "Islam," which means "making peace" with Him and among men. "Muhammadanism"
is not the proper appellation of Islam. For Prophet Muhammad, like Prophet
Abraham and all other Prophets, was himself a Muslim, and not a Muhammadan!
Judaism means the religion of Judah, but what was Judah himself? Surely not a
Judaist! And similarly was Christ a Christian or a Jesuit? Certainly neither of
them! What were, then, the names of these two distinct religions? No names at
all!

Then we have the barbarous Latin word "religion," meaning "the fear of the
gods." It is now used to express "any mode of faith and worship." Now what is
the equivalent word for "religion" in the Bible? What expression did Moses or
Jesus use to convey the meaning of religion? Of course, the Bible and its
authors make no use of this word at all.

Now the Scriptural term used in the vision of Daniel is the same as applied
repeatedly by the Qur’an to Islam, namely, "Din" (and in the Qur’an, "Din"),
which means "recompense on the Day of Judgement." And the tribune is the "Dayyana"
or the "Judge." Let us read the description of this celestial Court of Judgement:
"the tribunes are set, the books are opened, and the ‘Dina’ – recompense of
judgment – is established." By the "Books" is to be understood the "Preserved
Tablets" wherein the decrees of God are inscribed from which the Qur’an was
revealed by the Angel Gabriel to Prophet Muhammad; and also the books of
accounts of every man’s actions. It was according to the decrees and laws of God
contained in that "Preserved Tablet," and the wicked actions of the Horn, that
the Great "Dayyana" – the Judge con- demned it to death and appointed Prophet
Muhammad to be "Adon," i.e. "Commander" or "lord," to destroy the monster. All
this language of Daniel is extremely Qur’anic. The religion of Islam is called "Dinu
‘I-Islam." It was according to the decrees and laws of this "Dina" that the "Bar
nasha" destroy- ed the Devil’s religion and his lieutenant the Horn. How can it,
then, be at all possible that any man other than Prophet Muhammad could be meant
by the appearance of a "Son- of-Man" in the presence of the Most High? Islam is,
indeed, a "judgment of peace," because it possesses an authen- ticated Book of
Law, with which justice is administered and iniquity punished, the truth
discerned and the falsehood con- demned; and above all, the Oneness of God, the
eternal rewards for good deeds, and eternal damnation for wicked actions are
clearly stated and defined. In English a magistrate is called "Justice of
Peace;" that is to say, a "judge of peace." Now this is in imitation of a Muslim
Judge, who settles a quarrel, decides a case, by punishing the guilty and
rewarding the innocent, thus restoring peace. This is Islam and the law of the
Qur’an. It is not Christianity nor the Gospel, for the latter absolutely forbids
a Christian to appeal to a judge, however innocent and oppressed he may be
(Matt. v. 25, 26, 38-48).

2. The Son-of-Man, or Bar nasha, is certainly Prophet Muhammad. For he came
after Constantine, and not before him as Jesus or any other Prophet did. The
Trinitarian regime in the East represented by the Horn, which we rightly
identify with the Emperior Constantine, was permitted to fight with the
Unitarians and vanquish them for a period described in the figurative,
prophetical language as "time, times and half a time," which phrase signifies
three centuries and a half, at the end of which all the power of idolatry on the
one hand and the Trinitarian dominion and tyranny on the other were eradicated
and swept away entirely. There is nothing more absurd than the assertion that
Judah the Maccabaeus (Maqbhaya) was the Bar nasha on the clouds, and the Horn
Antiochus. It is alleged that (if I remember aright) Antio- chus, after
desecrating the Temple of Jerusalem, lived only three years and a half – or
three days and a half – at the end of which time he perished. In the first
place, we know that Antiochus was a successor of Alexander the Great and King of
Syria, consequently one of the four heads of the winged Tiger and not the
eleventh Horn of the fourth Beast as stated in the vision. In the eighth chapter
of the Book of Daniel, the Ram and the He-goat are explained by a Saint as
representing the Persian and the Greek Empires respec- tively. It is expressly
explained that the Greek Empire immediately succeeded the Persian and that it
was divided into four kingdoms, as stated in the first vision. Secondly, the
Horn with the speech indicates that the person who blasphemed and changed the
Law and holy days could not be a pagan, but one who knew God and associated with
Him purposely the other two persons whom he had equally known, and perverted the
faith. Antiochus did not pervert the faith of the Jews by instituting a trinity
or plurality of Gods, nor did he change the Law of Moses and its festival days.
Thirdly, it is childish to give such a magnitude and importance to local and
insignificant events which took place between a petty king in Syria and a small
Jewish chief, so as to compare the latter with the glorious man who received the
homage of the millions of angels in the presence of the Almighty. More- over,
the prophetical vision describes and depicts the Bar nasha as the greatest and
the noblest of all men, for no other human being is reported in the Old
Testament to have been the object of such honor and grandeur as Prophet
Muhammad.

3. It is equally futile to claim for Jesus Christ this celestial honor given
to the Son-of-Man. There are two main reasons to exclude Jesus from this honor;
(a) If he is purely a man and prophet, and if we consider his work a success or
failure, then he is certainly far behind Muham- mad. But if he is believed to be
the third of the three in the Trinity, then he is not to be enlisted among men
at all. You fall into a dilemma, and you cannot get out of it; for in either
case the Bar nasha could not be Jesus. (b) If Jesus was commissioned to destroy
the fourth Beast, then instead of paying poll-tax or tribute to Caesar and
submitting himself to be bastinadoed or whipped by the Roman governor Pilate, he
would have chased away the Roman legions from Palestine and saved his country
and people.

4. There has never lived upon this earth a Prince – Prophet like Muhammad,
who belonged to a dynasty that reigned for a long period of about 2,500 years,
was absolutely independent and never bent its neck under a foreign yoke. And
certainly there has never been seen on earth another man like Prophet Muhammad,
who has rendered more material and moral service to his own nation in particular
and to the world in general. It is impossible to imagine another human being so
dignified and so worthy as Prophet Muhammad for such a magnificent glory and
honor as depicted in the prophetical vision. Let us just compare the great
Prophet Daniel with the Bar nasha he was beholding with awe and wonder. Daniel
was a slave or captive, though raised to the dignity of a vizier in the courts
of Babylon and Susa. What would, in the presence of the Almighty, be his
position when compared with Prophet Muhammad, who would be crowned as the Sultan
of the Prophets, the Leader of mankind, and the object of the angels’ homage and
admiration? Small wonder that the Prophet David calls Prophet Muhammad "My Lord"
(Psa, c. 10).

5. It is no wonder to find that on his night journey to Heaven Prophet
Muhammad was received with the highest honors by the Almighty and invested with
power to extirpate idolatry and the blasphemous Horn from countries given by God
to him and to his people as an everlasting heritage.

6. Another most amazing feature in this prophetical vision is, according to
my humble belief, that the sight of a Barnasha upon the clouds and his
presentation to the Almighty corresponds with and is simultaneous with the
Mi’raj – or night journey of the Prophet Muhammad; in other rds, this second
part of the vision of Daniel is to be identified with the Mi’raj! There are,
indeed, several indications both in the language of Daniel and in the "Hadith" –
the quotations of the Prophet of Allah – which lead me to this belief. The
Qur’an declares that during that night- journey God transported His worshiper
from the Sacred Mosque at Mecca to the Father Temple of Jerusalem. He blessed
the precincts of that Temple, then in ruins, and showed him His signs (chap.
xvii).

It is related by the Holy Prophet that at the Temple of Jerusalem he
officiated in his capacity of the Imam, and con- ducted the prayers with all the
company of the Prophets following him. It is further related that it was from
Jerusalem that he was carried up unto the Seventh Heaven, being ac- companied by
the spirits of the Prophets and Angels until he was taken to the presence of the
Eternal. The modesty of the Prophet which forbade him to reveal all that he saw,
heard and received from the Lord of Hosts is made good by Daniel, who narrates
the decision of Gods Judgement. It appears that the Spirit which interpreted the
vision to Daniel was not an Angel, as thoughtlessly remarked by me else- where,
but the Spirit or the Soul of a Prophet, for he calls "Qaddish" (in the
masculine gender) and "Qaddush" (iv. 10; viii. 13 ), which means a Saint or a
Holy Man – a very usual name of the Prophets and Saints. How glad must have been
the holy souls of the Prophets and the Martyrs who had been persecuted by those
four beasts especially more so when they saw the decree of death being
pronounced by the Almighty against the Trinitarian regime of Constantine and the
Seal of the Prophets being commissioned to kill and annihilate the uttering
Horn! It will also be remembered that this vision was seen as well during the
same night in which took place the journey of the Son of Man nasha from Mecca to
the heavens!

From the testimony of Daniel we, as Muslims, must admit that Prophet
Muhammad’s journey was corporeally performed – a thing of no impossibility to
the Omnipotent.

There must exist a law in physics according to which a body is not controlled
by the main body to which it belongs, or by the law of gravitation, but by the
law of velocity. A human body belonging to the earth cannot escape from it
unless a superior force of velocity should detach it from the force of
gravitation. Then there must also exist another law in physics according to
which a light body can penetrate into a thick one and a thick body into an even
still thicker or harder one through the means of a superior force, or simply
through the force of velocity. Without entering into the details of this subtle
ques- tion, suffice it to say that before the force of velocity the weight of a
solid body, whether moved or touched, is of no concern. We know the rate of the
velocity of the light from the sun or a star. If we discharge a bullet at the
rate, say, of 2,500 meters a second, we know it penetrates and pierces a body of
iron plate which is several inches thick. Similarly, an angel, who can move with
an infinitely greater velocity than that of the light of the sun and even the
thought in the mind, could, of course, transport the bodies of Prophet Jesus, to
save him from the crucifixion, and Prophet Muhammad in his miraculous challenge
of the Ascent Journey (Miraj) with an astounding facility and rapidity, and set
at nought the law of gravitation of the globe to which they belonged.

Paul also mentions a vision he had seen fourteen years before of a man who
had been taken up into the third heaven and then unto Paradise, where he heard
and saw words and objects that could not be described. The Churches and their
commentators have believed this man to be Paul himself. Although the language is
such as to convey to us the idea that he himself is the man, yet out of modesty
it is that he keeps it a secret lest he should be considered a proud man! (2 Cor.
xii. 1-4). Although the Qur’an teaches us that the Apostles of Jesus Christ were
good people, their writings cannot be relied upon, because the wrangling and
disputant Churches have subjected them to interpolations. The Gospel of St.
Barnabas states that Paul afterwards fell into an error and misled many of the
believers.

That Paul does not reveal the identity of the person seen by him in the
vision, and that the words which he heard in Paradise "cannot be spoken and no
man is permitted to speak them," shows that Paul was not himself the person who
was taken up to Heaven. To say that Paul, for reason of humility and out of
modesty, does not praise himself is simply to mis- represent Paul. He boasts of
having rebuked St. Peter to his face, and his epistles are full of expressions
about himself which do rather confirm the idea that Paul was neither humble nor
modest.

Besides, we know from his writings to the Galatians and the Romans what a
prejudiced Jew he was against Hagar and her son Ishmael. The glorious person he
saw in his vision could be no other than the person seen by Daniel! It was
Prophet Muhammad that he saw, and dare not report the words which were spoken to
him because on the one hand he was afraid of the Jews, and because on the other
he would have contradicted himself for having glorified himself so much with the
Cross and the crucified. I am half convinced that Paul was allowed to see the
Barnasha whom Daniel had seen some six centuries before, but "the angel of satan
who was continually pouring blows upon his head" (2 Cor. xii 7) forbade him to
reveal the truth! It this an admission by Paul that "the angel of Satan," as he
calls him, prohibited him from revealing the secret of Prophet Muhammad, whom he
had seen in his vision. If Paul was a true righteous worshiper of God, why was
he delivered into the hands of the "angel of the Devil" who was continually
beating him on the head? The more one reflects on the teachings of Paul, the
less one doubts that he was the prototype of Constantine the Great!

In conclusion, I may be permitted to draw a moral for the non-Muslims from
this wonderful vision of Daniel. They should take to heart a lesson from the
fate which befell the four beasts, and particularly the Horn, and to reflect
that Allah alone is the One True God; that the Muslims alone faithfully profess
His absolute Oneness; that He is Aware of their oppressions, and that they have
their Caliph of the Pro- phets near to the Throne of the Most High.