Documents of the Right Word

ooks. This they did because they thought there were deductions
and additions in Qur’ân al-kerîm.”
’Uthmân Efendi, the author of the book Tezkiya-i-Ahl-i-Bayt,
relates as follows: I was attending the Ministry of Education,
when a pile of drafts of tafsîr (explanation of Qur’ân al-kerîm)
written by the Saba’ group arrived in a couple of chests.
Permission was not given for their printing. They asked the
reason: “Is there anything incompatible with Islam in it?” “Yes,”
I replied. “You write that hadrat Alî was a disbeliever.” He was
exasperated. “Don’t be angry,” I pacified. “Listen! According to
the allegation written in the introduction, hadrat Talha asked
hadrat Alî, ‘It has been rumoured that hadrat ’Uthmân deducted
seventy âyats from Qur’ân al-kerîm and that hadrat ’Umar
deleted eighty âyats. Is this rumour true?’ When hadrat Alî
affirmed Talha queried again, ‘It is said that you possess the
unchanged copy of the Qur’ân. Do you?’ Hadrat Alî’s answer
was: ‘Certainly. And the copy I have is twice as copious as the
existing ones.’ When he was asked why he did not reveal it to
Muslims, he complained, ‘I would have given it to them if they had
elected me Khalîfa instead of Abû Bekr. Because they did not
elect me, I am not going to give it to them. I shall advise in my will
that it should be kept in secrecy by my offspring till the end of the
world.’ These things are written in your tafsîr. Now I ask you for
Allah’s sake: Because Jewry concealed the twenty Pentateuchal
verses informing about Muhammad ‘alaihis-salâm’, Allâhu ta’âlâ
declares in Qur’ân al-kerîm that they are disbelievers: ‘Could
there be anyone more cruel, more heretical than one who
conceals my âyats?’ According to your allegation, hadrat Alî
‘radiy-Allâhu anh’ concealed a copy twice as extensive as Qur’ân
al-kerîm, thus retaining more than three thousand âyats. Doesn’t
this allegation of yours impute worse cruelty and heresy to the
Lion of Allah? For Allah’s sake, answer this properly.”
Astounded, he could not find any answer. He said, “I am neither
Shiite nor Sunnite. I am a freemason.”
Jews feel hostility to Jebrâîl ‘alaihis-salâm’. Likewise, asserting
that by mistake Jebrâîl brought the Wahy to Muhammad ‘alaihissalâm’
instead of revealing it to hadrat Alî, the Saba’ group have
become hostile to Jebrâîl ‘alaihis-salâm’.
These facts show plainly that the fabricator of these lies could
not be Shiite or Sunnite. Actually, he is a Jew named Abdullah bin
Saba’.
One day I asked Mirza Ridâ, a Persian scholar who had
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