"The Saints" A short story

"The Saints"

A short story

Written by: Mohsen Hedili

Translated by: Rajaa Al Lawatia

Translation reviewed by: Jamila Hakam

This story does not begin when the neighbor appears for the first time with a gun in his belt, threatening the young couple. No, the story has begun much earlier when the couple were still small.

Both of them, when they were very young, witnessed how Muslims – their brothers in religion – were portrayed as ‘enemy number one’ of Western civilization. The country in which they lived and entrusted it with their lives was the one leading this campaign.     

In this hate-filled atmosphere against Muslims, both of them had a fear of dying at the hands of one of their fellow citizens, as some people had started to behave as if they were programmed, without a will, without a brain and with a weapon or more in their houses.

Instead of reacting with hatred and hostility to all of this, the little ones learned to live with a pure heart.

A pure heart is the opposite of the heart formed by TV and cinema; it’s the heart with no feelings of hatred for anyone: a heart full of love for Allah (God) and love for all His creatures, without any exception.

When the two of them grew up, they met, fell in love and got married. The husband had one condition: that they should love each other till death and they should die in each other's arms…

Wife: Why this kind of death?! Shouldn`t someone stay with the children?

Husband: Which children?
Wife: They will come, by Allah `s will...and they will be ten…
Husband: Why ten?
Wife: So some of them will survive the war...

Husband: When the children come we will change the rules of the game; but for us now, we are a new couple, so the law of love says: we live together and die together like Romeo and Juliet…

Wife: But Romeo and Juliet are not Muslims and they commit suicide, and Islam forbids suicide.

Husband: But they were human beings. The most beautiful thing in the story of Romeo and Juliet is that they died full of love – not hate, though they lived in a world full of hate: that’s what we have to learn from them.

 Wife: But don’t you see this love which makes a person kill himself is not beautiful?

Husband: We will love, but in another way. First, we’ll insist on loving each other like Romeo and Juliet, then our love will be for Allah’s sake because when love is for Allah’s sake, it will not end at our love for each other: it will extend to all creatures of Allah, without exception, even those who are prepared to kill us.

Wife: Would we love even those who are prepared to kill us?!                        

Husband: Since we want to die with pure hearts, there is no choice for us other than to fill our hearts with Absolute Love...

Wife: I'm scared that this Absolute Love will blind our eyes, so we don’t see those coming to kill us.

Husband: This is the tax of love: the person in love is only concerned with his loved ones…

Wife: [scared] Our world is no longer humane…

Husband:  Let’s remain humane and imitate the manners of the Prophet of Islam and all Allah’s prophets and be like Allah: merciful and fair.

Wife: Can’t you see that these ideas are very idealistic and far from reality?!

Husband: We, my dear, have to make our own world, in order to live happily. As for the others, we’ll not discuss their malice with them; we’ll spend our time loving each other and we’ll love them, too. If they use weapons that they own in this war they’ve started preparing for, so it will be in effect a war against all humanity…

Wife: Darling, can’t you see that the problem is we are Muslims?

Husband: [Sadly] Yes, I know, --

Wife: [interrupting] I don’t mean... but I want to say that it’s Islam that bothers them, not us. The popularity of Islam in our society has focused their attention on us.

Husband: So that’s why they are trying to make Islam look ugly...

Wife: But you cannot make a beautiful thing ugly.

Husband: You distort it.

Wife: Is there no other way to distort Islam than killing people?!

This conversation between the young couple happened one month after their wedding. A month later, while they were safe and happy in their house, there was a knock on the door. It was the wife’s sister; they welcomed her warmly with love and let her in. While the door was still open, their neighbor – who had already threatened them before – appeared: this time with a weapon in his hand. They greeted him with pure hearts, but he pushed them in front of him into the living room, brought them down on their knees and stood on their heads.

Until this moment, the three of them couldn’t have imagined (even for a second) that their neighbor could kill them. The wife and her sister didn’t feel that death was so close until they heard the husband whispering the Shahada (testimony of faith):

I bear witness that there is no God but Allah, and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.

Time passed by like lightning. The husband and wife found themselves looking down, from about two meters above, at their own bodies on the ground. The sister’s soul was still in her body; she was bleeding heavily from the head, and the neighbor was standing and looking down at her as she finished her Shahada.  When her soul joined the others above, the neighbor was pacing back and forth. Then he threw himself onto the couch, put his hands on his cheeks and looked down at the ground.

Husband: (cheerfully) Did you notice that we’ve happily left our bodies?!

Wife: I found the joy of Absolute Love that you were talking to me about!

Husband: (happily) Let's go.
Wife: Go and leave the neighbor alone in our house?!

Sister: After all, we can’t go down to him; there is a gentle wave lifting us up.

 Wife: (trying to get down) You’re right – I cannot go down!

Husband: We must move quickly and visit our loved ones before we get further up and won’t be able to see them.

Wife: I’ll visit my family...

(The sister approaches the wife and holds her free hand which wasn’t holding onto the husband.)

Husband: So, now we have to leave and we will meet up there in an hour.

…

When they met again, the three of them were on a high altitude and the scene in front of them looked like a scene from the window of a plane.

They talked about their visits to their loved ones: their families, friends and teachers. They were happy even though they talked about the sadness and the grief of the people they had visited.

Wife: Have you noticed that we don’t feel sad for their grief?

Husband: (laughing) Their grief! They are sad for us...

Sister: When I saw Mother crying sadly I wanted to share her grief, but I couldn’t: it seems that we are no longer able to feel sad.

Then, a very beautiful creature approached them. It looked like a white dove but transparent, or as if there were something like a mirror inside it.

Creature: Would you like me to appear to you in the form of a dove?

Wife:  And who are you, lovely creature?

Angel: I am an angel.

Sister: (smiling) Are you Azrael?! (the angel of death)

Angel: Haven’t you seen Azrael? How did you get out of your bodies, then?

Husband: From our bodies?

Wife: (laughing) By ourselves; it was very easy.

Sister: And we were laughing, too.

Angel : That’s a good sign for you then…

Wife: Why?

Angel: That’s the death of Saints. Now, be prepared to see a last view of the world, after that you will forget it forever.

Sister: Forget it forever?! Can I forget my own father?

Angel: Turn.

The three of them turned and saw the Earth in a way they had never seen it before: not even in the pictures taken from spaceships. They saw the Earth entirely – from all sides at the same time.

Husband: It seems that we are in a place in the universe or existence which makes us see things from a completely different angle.

Angel: (smiling at the husband) Look...

The Earth looked like it did at night, almost completely covered by points of light.

Angel: This is a scene we see, only with the souls of Saints.

Sister: Is it because it is a very beautiful scene?

Angel: Not only that. Do you know what those lights are?

Husband: It must be the houses and cities shining at night.

Angel:  No, it is not night now and they are not the lights of lanterns, but the lights of the souls which are saddened and shed tears for you... Pray for all those who love you, because you will forget them soon.

The three looked at the Earth in front of them and said spontaneously, at the same moment:

May Allah have mercy on you.

At that moment, the angel smiled.

Sister: Why did you smile?

Angel: You uttered their exact prayers for you; the hearts of loving people are really clear and pure – like a mirror.

When he mentioned the word “mirror”, a great clear mirror appeared in front of them.

Angel: (moving towards the mirror) Follow me.  

All of them started moving towards their reflections in the mirror.  As they approached their reflections, they saw that they became more beautiful the closer they got: beauty upon beauty upon beauty, till they were so amazed by their own beauty they had to shut their eyes.

At this moment, the angel spoke:

Do not open your eyes until I tell you to...

(The end)