HAGGAI ii.7  & Malachi iii. I

 

Some two centuries after the idolatrous and impenitent Kingdom of Israel  was overthrown, and the whole population of the ten tribes deported into Assyria,  Jerusalem and the glorious temple of Solomon were razed to the ground by the Chaldeans, and the remnant of Judah and Benjamin was transported into Babylonia.

After a period of seventy years’ captivity, the Jews were permitted to return to their country with full authority to build again their  ruined city and the temple. When the foundations of the new house of God were  being laid, there arose a tremendous uproar of joy and acclamation from the  assembly; while the old men  and women who had seen the gorgeous temple of Solomon before, burst into a bitter weeping. It was on this solemn occasion that the Almighty sent His worshiper the Prophet Haggai to console the sad assembly  with this important message:

"And I will shake all nations, and the Himdah all the nations will come;  and I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord of hosts. Mine is the silver,  mine is the gold, says the Lord of hosts, the glory of my last house shall be greater  than that of the first one, says the Lord of hosts; and in this place I will give  Shalom, says the Lord of hosts." (Haggai, ii. 7-9)

I have translated the above paragraph from the only copy of the Bible at  my disposal, lent to me by an Assyrian lady cousin in her own vernacular  language. But let us consult the English versions of the Bible, which we find have rendered the original Hebrew words himda and shalom into "desire" and "peace"  respectively.

Jewish and Christian commentators alike have given the utmost importance to the double promise contained in the above prophecy. They both understand a messianic prediction in the word Himda. Indeed, here is a wonderful prophecy confirmed by the usual biblical formula of the divine oath,  "says the Lord Sabaoth," four times repeated. If this prophecy be taken in the abstract sense of the words himda and shalom as "desire" and "peace," then the prophecy becomes nothing more than an unintelligible aspiration. But if we understand by the term himda a concrete idea, a person and reality, and in the word shalom, not a condition, but a living and active force and a definitely established religion, then this prophecy must be admittedly true and fulfilled in the person of Ahmed and the establishment of Islam. For himda and shalom (or shlama) have precisely the same significance respectively as Ahmed (Muhammad) and Islam.

Before endeavoring to prove the fulfillment of this prophecy, it will be well to explain the etymology of the two words as briefly as possible: -

(a) Himda. The clause in the original Hebrew text reads thus: "ve yavu himdath kol haggoyim," which literally rendered into English would be "and will  come the Himda of all nations." The final hi in Hebrew, as in Arabic, is changed into th, or t when in the genitive case. The word is derived from an archaic  Hebrew - or rather Aramaic - root hmd (consonants pronounced hemed). In  Hebrew hemed is generally used in the sense of great desire, covet, appetite and  lust. The ninth command of the Decalogue is: "Lo tahmod ish reikha" ("Thou shalt not covet the wife of thy neighbor"). In Arabic the verb hemida, from the same consonants hmd, means "to praise," and so on. What is more praised and illustrious than that which is most craved for, coveted, and desired? Whichever of  the two meanings be adopted, the fact that Ahmed is the Arabic form of Himda  remains indisputable and decisive.

The Holy Quran (ch.61:6 ) declares that Jesus  announced unto the people of Israel the coming of Mohammad under the name or title Ahmad: "And when Jesus, the  son of Mary said: ’Children  of Israel, I am sent to you by Allah to confirm the  Torah that is before me, and to give news of a Messenger who will come after me  whose name shall be Ahmad.’ Yet when he came to them with clear proofs, they  said: ’This is clear sorcery.’" 

The Gospel of St. John, being written in Greek, uses the name Paracletos, a barbarous form unknown to classical Greek literature. But Periclytos, which corresponds exactly with Ahmed in its signification of "illustrious," "glorious"  and "praised," in its superlative degree, must have been the translation into Greek  of Himda or probably Hemida of the Aramaic form, as uttered by Jesus Christ.  Alas! there is no Gospel extant in the original language spoken by Jesus!

(b) As to the etymology and signification of the words shalom, shlama,  and the Arabic salam, Islam, I need not detain the reader by dragging him into  linguistic details. Any Semitic scholar knows that Shalom and Islam are derived  from one and the same root and that both mean peace, submission, and resignation.

This being made clear, I propose to give a short exposition of this  prophecy of Haggai. In order to understand it better, let me quote another  prophecy from the last book of the Old Testament called Mallachai, or Mallakhi,  or in the Authorized Version, Malachi (chap. iii. I):

"Behold I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before  me: suddenly he will come to his temple. He is the Adonai (i.e. the Lord) whom  you desire, and the Messenger of the Covenant with whom you are pleased. Lo he  is coming, says the Lord of hosts."

Then compare these mysterious oracles with the wisdom embodied in the  sacred verse of the Quran: "Exalted is He who caused His worshiper (Prophet  Muhammad) to travel in the night from the sacred Mosque (Mecca) to the farthest  Mosque (Jerusalem) which We have blessed around it that We might show him of   Our signs. He is the Hearer, the Seer." Ch.17:1 Quran

 

That by the person coming suddenly to the temple, as foretold in the two  biblical documents above mentioned, Prophet Muhammad, and not Prophet Jesus,  is intended, the following arguments must surely suffice to convince every impartial observer:-

1.                  The kinship, the relation and resemblance between the two  tetrograms Himda and Ahmd, and the identity of the root “hmd” from which both  substantives are derived, leave not a single particle of doubt that the subject in the  sentence "and the Himda of all nations will come" is Ahmed; that is to say,  Muhammad. There is not the remotest etymological connection between himda  and any other names of "Jesus," "Christ," "Savior," not even a single consonant in  common between them.

 

2.                  Even if it be argued that the Hebrew form Hmdh (read himdah) is  an abstract substantive meaning "desire, lust, covetousness, and praise," the  argument would be again in favor of our thesis; for then the Hebrew form would,  in etymology, be exactly equivalent in meaning and in similarity to, or rather  identity with, the Arabic form Himdah. In whatever sense you wish to take the  tetrogram Hmdh, its relation to Ahmed and Ahmedism is decisive, and has  nothing to do with Jesus and Jesuism! If St. Jerome, and before him the authors of  the Septuagint, had preserved intact the Hebrew form Hmdh, instead of putting  down the Latin "cupiditas" or the Seek "euthymia," probably the translators  appointed by King James I would have also reproduced the original form in the  Authorized Version, and the Bible Society have followed suit in their translations  into Islamic languages.