verses from the Qur'an which we have quoted, and if any reliance is to be plated upon the Traditions which Baihaqi and others record as handed down from Muhammad's lips to that effect: for every Christian knows that such a fancy is absolutely contrary to Scripture (e. g. Rev. i. 17,18).

Here again certain Apocryphal works come to our aid. In an Arabic book (probably of Coptic origin) called "The Decease of our holy Father the old man Joseph the Carpenter," we are told regarding Enoch and Elijah, who ascended into heaven without dying, that "These men must come to the world at the end of time, in the day of trouble and fear and difficulty and oppression, and must die" (cap. xxxi.) ¹. In a somewhat similar Coptic work entitled "The History of the Falling Asleep of Mary" we read almost the same words, "But as for these others" (Enoch and Elijah) "it is necessary for them also finally to taste of death ²." Muhammad must have heard some such expression, for he says twice over in the Qur'an (Surah III., Al 'Imram, 182, and Surah XXIX., Al 'Ankabut, 57), "Every soul doth taste of death." Holding, as he apparently did, that Jesus ascended to heaven alive (Surah III., 48) it naturally followed, to his mind, that Christ also,

like Enoch and Elijah, would necessarily die after his second Advent. Hence Christ's vacant tomb now lies ready for Him at Medina, between the graves of Muhammad and Abu Bakr!

Muhammadan Tradition also tells us that Christ shall take a wife after His return ¹. This is due to a misunderstanding of such passages as Rev. xix. 7-9 where we read: "Let us rejoice and be exceeding glad, and let us give the glory unto Him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready. And it was given unto her that she should array herself in fine linen, bright and pure: for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. And he saith unto me, Blessed are they which are bidden to the marriage supper of the Lamb." Of course the meaning of this allegorical passage is fully explained elsewhere (e. g. Rev. xxi. 2; Eph. v. 22-32) as referring to the perfect love and complete union in spiritual matters which will then exist between the Saviour and His purified and redeemed Church.

The statement that Christ is to live forty years ² on the earth after His return must have originated in a misunderstanding of Acts i. 3, where we learn that He remained for forty days with His disciples after His Resurrection and before His Ascension.