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Muhammad SAW dalam Perjanjian Lama & Baru.Abdu'l-
WHAT EVERY CHRISTIAN & JEW SHOULD KNOW.
Ahad Dawud is the former Rev. David Abdu Benjamin Keldani, B.D.,
a Roman Catholic priest of the Uniate-Chaldean sect. He was born in
1867 at Urmia in Persia; educated from his early infancy in that town.
From 1886-89 he was on the teaching staff of the Archbishop of
Canterbury's Mission to the Assyrian (Nestorian) Christians at Urmia.
In 1892 he was sent by Cardinal Vaughan to Rome, where he underwent a
course of philosophical and theological studies at the Propaganda Fide
College, and in 1895 was ordained Priest. In 1892 Professor Dawud
contributed a series of articles to The Tablet on "Assyria, Rome and
Canterbury"; and also to the Irish Record on the "Authenticity of the
Pentateuch." He has several translations of the Ave Maria in different
languages, published in the illustrated Catholic Missions. While in
Constantinople on his way to Persia in 1895, he contributed a long
series of articles in English and French to the daily paper, published
there under the name of The Levant Herald, on "Eastern Churches." In
1895 he joined the French Lazarist Mission at Urmia, and published for
the first time in the history of that Mission a periodical in the
vernacular Syriac called Qala-La-Shara, i.e. "The Voice of Truth." In
1897 he was delegated by two Uniate-Chaldean Arch- bishops of Urmia
and of Salmas to represent the Eastern Catholics at the Eucharistic
Congress held at Paray-le-Monial in France under the presidency of
Cardinal Perraud. This was, of course, an official invitation. The
paper read at the Congress by "Father Benjamin" was published in the
Annals of the Eucharistic Congress, called "Le Pellerin" of that year.
In this paper, the Chaldean Arch-Priest (that being his official
title) deplored the Catholic system of education among the Nestorians. In
1888 Father Benjamin was back again in Persia. In his native village,
Digala, about a mile from the town, he opened a school. The next year
he was sent by the Ecclesiastical authorities to take charge of the
diocese of Salmas, where a sharp and scandalous conflict between the
Uniate Archbishop, Khudabash, and the Lazarist Fathers for a long time
had been menacing a schism. On the day of New Year 1900, Father
Benjamin preached his last and memorable sermon to a large
congregation, including many non-Catholic Armenians and others in the
Cathedral of St. George's Khorovabad, Salmas. The preacher's subject
was "New Century and New Men." He recalled the fact that the Nestorian
Missionaries, before the appearance of Islam, namely "submission" to
God, had preached the Gospel in all Asia; that they had numerous
establishments in India (especially at the Malabar Coast), in Tartary,
China and Mongolia; and that they translated the Gospel to the Turkish
Uighurs and in other languages; that the Catholic, American and
Anglican Missions, in spite of the little good they had done to the
Assyro- Chaldean nation in the way of preliminary education, had split
the nation - already a handful in Persia, Kurdistan and Mesopotamia
into numerous hostile sects; and that their efforts were destined to
bring about the final collapse. Con- sequently he advised the natives
to make some sacrifices in order to stand upon their own legs like
men, and not to depend upon the foreign missions, etc.
The preacher was perfectly right in principle; but his remarks were
unfavorable to the interests of the Lord's Missionaries. This sermon
hastily brought the Apostolique Delegate, Mgr. Lesne, from Urmia to
Salmas. He remained to the last a friend of Father Benjamin. They both
returned to Urmia. A new Russian Mission had already been estab-
lished in Urmia since 1899. The Nestorians were enthu- siastically
embracing the religion of the "holy" Tsar of All Russias!
Five big and ostentatious missions, Americans, Anglicans, French,
Germans and Russians with their colleges, press backed up by rich
religious societies, Consuls and Ambassadors, were endeavoring to
convert about one hundred thousand Assyro-Chaldeans from Nestorian
heresy unto one or another of the five heresies. But the Russian
Mission soon outstripped the others, and it was this mission which in
1915 pushed or forced the Assyrians of Persia, as well as the
mountaineer tribes of Kurdistan, who had then immigrated into the
plains of Salmas and Urmia, to take up arms against their respective
Governments. The result was that half of his people perished in the
war and the rest expelled from their native lands.
The great question which for a long time had been working its solution
in the mind of this priest was now approaching its climax. Was
Christianity, with all its multi- tudinous shapes and colors, and with
its unauthentic, spurious and corrupted Scriptures, the true Religion
of God? In the summer of 1900 he retired to his small villa in the
middle of vineyards near the celebrated fountain of Chali- Boulaghi in
Digala, and there for a month spent his time in prayer and meditation,
reading over and over the Scriptures in their original texts. The
crisis ended in a formal resigna- tion sent in to the Uniate
Archbishop of Urmia, in which he frankly explained to (Mgr.) Touma
Audu the reasons for abandoning his sacerdotal functions. All attempts
made by the ecclesiastical authorities to withdraw his decision were
of no avail. There was no personal quarrel or dispute between Father
Benjamin and his superiors; it was all ques- tion of conscience.
For several months Mr. Dawud, as he was now called, was employed in
Tabriz as Inspector in the Persian Service of Posts and Customs under
the Belgian experts. Then he was taken into the service of the Crown
Prince Muhammad 'Ali Mirza as teacher and translator. It was in 1903
that he again visited England and there joined the Unitarian
Community. And in 1904 he was sent by the British and Foreign
Unitarian Association to carry on an educational and enlightening work
among his country people. On his way to Persia he visited
Constantinople; and after several interviews with the Sheikhu 'I-Islam
Jemalu 'd-Din Effendi and other Ulemas, he embraced the Holy Religion
of Islam, meaning submission to God.
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