The Holy Woman

by Shahraz, Qaisra

  ‘My guilt,’ he whispered, ‘from forcing my daughter to become a Shahzadi Ibadat. I shouldn’t have done it.’ He was unable to look at his wife.

  Shahzada’s indrawn breath disconcerted him. She said nothing – for she felt absolutely nothing for her husband. Thus the words of understanding and support that Habib so yearned to hear failed to leave her mouth.

  ‘I know that you have never forgiven me,’ he went on. ‘Have you?’

  She was sitting on his bed, while he lay resting against the headboard, his hands crossed behind his neck. Shahzada got off the bed and walked towards the door.

  ‘Have you, Shahzada?’ His raised voice stopped her short.

  ‘Does it matter whether I have forgiven you or not?’ She turned round, but her hand remained firmly on the door handle.

  ‘Of course it matters! You were right all along. I lost a wife and a beloved close friend the day my Zarri Bano became a Holy Woman. You act as normal, yet you have kept me at arm’s length. I never knew my Shahzada was capable of such hardness. She was a gentle, warm person. In which grave have I buried her? The rapport we had has gone, your love, your respect … all gone. I can’t cope with it any more! Forgive me, Shahzada – I beg of you!’

  What happened next startled both of them. Habib jumped off the bed and went over to Shahzada, kneeling in front of her on the floor, clasping her feet in supplication. She froze, looking down at her proud husband bent meekly over her feet, his hands clutching the strap of her sandals.

  It was appalling to see Habib abase himself like this. Although she empathised with his pain, she could not respond to it. It was all too late.

  ‘Habib, please stand up,’ she said irritably. ‘Do not humiliate us both. It is not seemly for you to touch my feet. You know you cannot turn the clock back. What is done is done. You killed your beloved wife the day you threatened her with three divorces – and the dead do not return. Be happy that Zarri Bano has become the woman you wanted to shape her into.’ Her face was marked with deep lines of pain.

  ‘I wish to God that I had never forced our daughter into it,’ Habib cried. ‘Seeing Ruby happily married and with a son, I shrink inside myself with horror. “What have I done?” I ask myself over and over again. I cry bitterly in my sleep and prayers. I have deliberately prevented my daughter from having a normal life like Ruby’s. Who am I – a god? Shahzada, what right did I have to change another person’s destiny? I cannot go on this holy pilgrimage to Mecca without asking for Zarri Bano’s forgiveness and yours. Allah will not accept my hajj rituals until I do this. Prophet Mohammed, may peace be upon him, has said that he who goes on hajj, must first reconcile himself or herself to everyone and ask for their forgiveness. As hajj is going to be my spiritual journey, I must come back as a person newly born. I have learned to transcend my male ego, Shahzada, and to be humble. It is that humility which has reduced me to come crawling to your feet. No man, no husband of my calibre would ever do that. You must recognise, and appreciate that! You talk about dying. Well Habib too died on the day Sikander entered my home, for I haven’t been the same man since.’ His eyes never left her face.

  ‘So you see, I have to beg for Zarri Bano’s forgiveness and to free her from the oath never to marry. What I hadn’t bargained on was that I would lose you too in the process. Allah Pak will never forgive me for treating you the way I did four years ago. I now cannot live without your respect and love, Shahzada. Don’t shut me out of your mind and heart, please! I hate myself and what I stand for. When my mind compares Zarri Bano with what she used to be like, I recoil. I wanted the world for my daughter, but we lost her to books, to religious conventions and to a black burqa. She is so remote, so inaccessible.’

  There were tears of remorse in his eyes. He went on, choking with emotion as he spoke: ‘That dimple in her cheeks, which I used to delight in seeing and touching when she was a child … I have not glimpsed it for three years. She hardly ever laughs or smiles any more. Oh where is our beloved Zarri Bano? My mind and conscience will not rest, Shahzada, until I have laid bare my soul to her. I want my daughter back,’ he ended passionately, then waited for his wife to speak to bring him the comfort he so desparately craved. But Shahzada’s bitter words now lashed back at him.

  ‘It is all your fault. You had wanted to keep your beautiful daughter, your beloved possession, at home. You didn’t want to part with either her or the fields. You couldn’t stand losing her to Sikander, your rival for her affection, so you thought. Your jealousy has devoured our whole family! You wanted homage and reverence at your daughter’s doorstep? Well, now you’ve got them! People travel from far and wide in Pakistan to seek her moral and intellectual guidance on religious matters. So there should really be no regrets, Habib.’ Shahzada didn’t bother to disguise the contempt that had suddenly surfaced, in both her eyes and voice.

  The light of hope in Habib’s eyes died and he rose to his feet. Shahzada was right. He had killed his beloved wife that terrible afternoon when he had threatened her with divorce for questioning his decision about Zarri Bano’s fate. To be offered three thalaks for no apparent reason would emotionally kill any woman, especially someone of Shahzada’s gentle nature who had worshipped him. It was too cruel a punishment, merely for standing up for her daughter’s rights.

  ‘I will go and get Zarri Bano for you,’ Shahzada told him coldly. ‘I think she is in the lounge with Ruby and Sikander.’ She left her husband standing in the middle of the room, the look of a lost man in his eyes. The padlock still clutching at her heart wouldn’t let her utter any words of consolation. As she closed the door behind her, Shahzada wondered sadly if she was ever going to be able to forgive him.

  As soon as Zarri Bano walked into the room, Habib came directly to the point. ‘My dearest daughter, something has been bothering me lately. In fact ever since you became a Holy Woman.’

  ‘What is it, Father? What’s worrying you?’ Zarri Bano said anxiously.

  ‘I have to ask your forgiveness, for I cannot go on this holy pilgrimage without doing that.’ His voice was husky with emotion. ‘I have already asked your mother for hers. You see, I sinned against you both. Please forgive me, Zarri Bano, for forcing you to give up Sikander, marriage and the life you previously had. What we did was wrong. I do not know how to turn the clock back. My dear daughter, I would give anything to have the old Zarri Bano back again.’

  ‘Father, there is nothing to forgive,’ she said gently. ‘You shouldn’t feel guilty. I have gained so very much from my new role – in fact, all the things that you said I would.’

  ‘Is that the truth, my dear,’ Habib interrupted, eagerly. ‘Or are you saying it just to make me feel better?’

  ‘No, Father. As Allah Pak is my witness, I speak the truth. By your action, you opened the door to another world for me. I am, I hope, a good Muslim now. I hope I perform all my duties well. I also now have the knowledge to show and direct others along the same path. I have met people that the old Zarri Bano would never have met. I have visited places that in my old life I would never have had the chance to see. It is true my life is not like Ruby’s, but mine is fulfilled in its own way. Therefore, you have simply nothing to worry about,’ she ended with a forgiving smile on her face.

  Zarri Bano’s words were like pearls of water falling out of her beautiful mouth onto Habib’s thirsting soul, offering a precious salve to his conscience. He gratefully drank them in.

  ‘Her words are not enough,’ his conscience prompted, however. Half-heartedly he tried again. ‘My daughter, I have thought long and hard about this issue, and I know that I have done wrong. No matter what you say, I want to make amends. If now, or in the future, you ever wish to marry, you will have my full blessing.’

  ‘Father, why do you say such things!’ Zarri Bano cried in disbelief, wondering if Habib had become deranged. ‘I don’t want to marry, ever. I am a Holy Woman now!’

  ‘You wanted to marry then, as I remember clearly – so why not now? I have committed a c
rime not only against you but also against our faith. I have read the books on Islam and the words of condemnation jump out at me!’

  Zarri Bano listened to her father in silence, then answered without any trace of bitterness. ‘I, too, have studied those books and read the jurists’ interpretations, from Imam Malike and Shafia’s school of thought on this precise issue. Marriage is to be encouraged and not prevented. The family unit and the raising of a family is at the heart of our faith. But I absolve you of that guilt. I accept your blessing, your permission, as my guardian, for me to marry, if I ever so wish.

  ‘Marriage, however, has no relevance in my life now, Father. I am truly happy with things as they are. There should be no compulsion to marry if one is really against it – that, too, is written, Father. There is no man I want to marry.’ She quashed the inner whisper: ‘There was one a long time ago – but you prevented me from marrying him.’

  ‘If you are sure? If you ever change your mind, then you have my blessing, my child, remember that!’ Habib pressed earnestly.

  ‘Never, Father!’

  He nodded his head in understanding. Smiling, she stood up to leave.

  ‘How are the preparations for the hajj going?’ she asked. ‘I was just talking about our hajj downstairs with Ruby and Brother Sikander. The tickets are sorted out; our clothing has been prepared. I am going through the book on hajj with Ruby, so that she knows what she has to do once she gets to Mecca, and also knows what to expect. I have read two or three books on the subject already. Sister Sakina has been filling in the gaps for me. She was saying that it is best to go to Medina first and say our forty obligatory prayers in the Prophet’s Mosque, before the hajj. Apparently it is quieter there at that time, than after hajj, when most of the pilgrims decide to visit Medina all at the same time. When you went, Father, did you go to Medina before or after the hajj?’

  ‘We went before. Sakina is right – it is not such a rush then. One has plenty of time to visit the holy places, and it’s easier to find a good hotel.’

  ‘Well, we have booked our tickets so that we have two weeks before the hajj, and one week after. That gives us about six days in Jeddah and Mecca and then eight days in Medina before returning to Mecca on the day before the hajj begins. Brother Sikander has contacts in all three places. He has booked us rooms in good hotels for all of our stay.’

  ‘I am pleased that he will be going with us,’ Habib approved. ‘We need a young man on a journey like this. Anyway, with four women, there is need of another male escort for the hajj.’

  ‘Yes I am glad he is going with us as well. Haris will miss his parents, though.’

  ‘I know, that’s the only problem – we’ll all miss him. I can’t wait till next month, Zarri Bano,’ Habib said enthusiastically. ‘It will be our first hajj together as a whole family.’

  ‘I am looking forward to it too,’ she told her father warmly.’ Right, I had better get downstairs. Brother Sikander was sorting out the paperwork for our visas; they are going back to Karachi in half an hour.’

  ‘Aren’t they staying the night?’

  ‘No. Goodnight, Father. Khudah Hafiz.’

  When Zarri Bano had left, Habib went to lie down on his bed feeling happier than he had been for a long, long time. He was so glad that he had had this chat with his daughter, and she had relieved him of some of the burden.

  Chapter 43

  THE PLANE RESOUNDED with the chanting of the hajj salutations, Talbiya, by devoted pilgrims.

  ‘Here I am, O Allah, here I am in Your presence! You have no partner, here I am! You alone deserve all praise and gratitude! You alone can bestow favours and blessings. Sovereignty is Yours and You have no partner,’ Zarri Bano happily translated to her sister as they sat together on one side of the aisle and Sikander, Habib and Shahzada sat on the other side.

  It was a spectacular sight with the plane full of pilgrims, dressed in their special loose white hajj robes, all chanting enthusiastically: ‘Here I come, oh Allah’, and heading for the house of God, the holy Al Kaba, in Saudi Arabia in Mecca Sharif. One pilgrim stood near the cockpit of the plane, and using the plane’s intercom system led the chanting for their pilgrimage.

  ‘Have I got the words right, Zarri Bano?’ Ruby asked anxiously. She had learned the Talbiya by heart at home, but now in the excitement of the journey she seemed to have jumbled all the words yet again, and had to keep on glancing at the small guidebook.

  ‘Yes you have, darling.’ Zarri Bano smiled indulgently at her younger sister. An expression of pure joy lit her face all of a sudden. ‘Isn’t it exciting? I cannot wait to get to Mecca. People from the four corners of the world are converging onto Saudi Arabia. Dressed like this, Ruby, you too look like a devout, religious woman!’

  Zarri Bano’s eyes slid over the white robe covering her sister’s whole body from her head to her feet. Ruby was very uncomfortable in the cumbersome clothes and head covering, but there was nothing she could do about it. All the other women were dressed in a similar fashion. Her hair, like theirs was tied back and hidden under the head covering, for it was wrong to let even one wisp of hair be seen, or for a single hair to fall in the Holy Mosque, the Al Kaba. ‘Even one hair littering the Holy Mosque would be a desecration of the highest sort, so be very careful,’ Zarri Bano had drummed into Ruby, frightening her at first, until she saw the amused expression on her older sister’s face.

  Ruby hoped she could keep up with everybody in the prayer sequences, which they all seemed to know by heart and which she was trying to learn. She caught her husband looking at her. He was smiling and also chanting the Talbiya whole-heartedly.

  ‘Allah must be very busy listening to everybody’s prayers today at the holy site of Arafat in Saudi Arabia,’ Ruby chuckled to herself. ‘When all the pilgrims come from every corner of the world …’

  The stars shone brightly in the night sky over the small town of Muzdalifah, a few kilometres away from the holy site of Arafat in Saudi Arabia. Like their million fellow pilgrims, Zarri Bano and her family had offered a special afternoon prayers at Arafat and had become kjajjis. Following in the footsteps of their Holy Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), they were duty bound to spend a night in Muzdalifah.

  Lying on her jute sleeping mat, purchased in Jeddah, Zarri Bano stared up at the sky above them with its stars winking down at them, acknowledging their holy presence in the small town.

  ‘This is what hajj is all about, my dear Ruby!’ A trace of excitement still bubbled in her voice. It had been a very eventful day. She turned to face her sister, half-asleep on another mat, only a foot away. ‘Have you ever spent a night like this in your life? I know I haven’t. My bones ache, but my heart feels joyous and is still throbbing with the excitement. Look at the stars above, Ruby, they are greeting us and saying “Salaam. You are a hajen now.” Can you imagine, how on this very spot, over the centuries, every year, thousands of pilgrims, from all over the world have slept here? For one day each year, this place becomes the centre of the universe. Are you listening, Ruby?’ Zarri Bano raised her head to look at her sister.

  ‘Hmm, I am,’ the other girl replied, yawning. ‘You are right, this is a unique occasion. I am so glad we came. I don’t even mind the small pebbles digging into my back through my mat. You had better try to get some sleep, Zarri Bano. We have a very busy day ahead of us in Minah tomorrow. Look, I can hear Mother and Father snoring soundly, although Sikander Sahib is still tossing and turning.’

  ‘I bet the pebbles are digging into his ribcage!’ Zarri Bano joked. ‘Do you remember we have to collect seventy-two pebbles for the “Devil’s” shaitan site? So these under your mat and your husband’s will come in handy!’

  When Zarri Bano turned on her other side, she came face to face with a hefty young Nigerian woman saying her late night-time prayers, only a few paces away. The woman’s husband was sitting near by, loudly reciting surahs from the Holy Quran. Zarri Bano closed her eyes, totally content to share the moment with people from all over the w
orld. Knowing she would never forget this night.

  By the time Ruby got up, her sister had already read three chapters from the Holy Quran. She stood up, feeling embarrassed. Everybody was saying their prayers. She felt as if she had been sleeping in the middle of a mosque amidst strangers. Queues for the public toilets and ablution places grew longer. Makeshift taps had been installed wherever possible every few yards for the benefit of the pilgrims. Stalls were already set up for breakfast.

  By six o’ clock in the morning, the sun had risen and everybody was up. Soon after breakfast, gathering their belongings together, the pilgrims all headed back towards Minah, and their tents.

  Ahead of them lay the third important day of hajj, to be spent on the open plain of Minah in their tents. It was a day to be celebrated by Muslims everywhere – culminating in Eid-al-Adha, the second most important festival.

  ‘On this day, centuries earlier,’ Zarri Bano explained to Ruby, ‘Prophet Ibrahim turned his back on three consecutive occasions and spat on the shaitan, the Devil. In his footsteps we are to throw pebbles at the marked spot, to show our rejection of him. The shaitan had tried to dissuade Prophet Ibrahim from sacrificing his son Ismail.’

  Reaching their tents by late morning, Zarri Bano, Ruby and Shahzada were told to take a rest by Habib, while he and Sikander, went to arrange the next holy ritual, the animal sacrifices, in the makeshift abattoirs nearby. By late afternoon, trays of meat began to arrive. All pilgrims were duty-bound to distribute a portion of it to their neighbours, to eat a certain portion themselves and give the remainder to the Saudi government officials, for it to be frozen and sent to needy families all over the world.

  After their ceremonial baths and change of clothing, the women cut off strands of their hair. The men either shaved or cut a portion of their hair, as a sign of humility and spiritual rebirth.