The Prophet's Ladder Read online

  Ali’s father dipped the teapot to the serving tray as the liquid stopped its profusion from the spout, and laughed as his friends clapped in approval of his performance. He looked up to see his son standing above him. “Ali, my boy!” he bellowed above the din of the cafe. The men watching the football match had begun to shout at the television. “Have you come to watch my performance? God is great!”

  “God is great, father. It was very impressive. I recall you showing me that trick when I was a boy.”

  “Yes, yes. You and your brothers always loved it.” Ali’s father, named Salah, nodded in agreement.

  “Father I have come to talk to you about mother…. she is not doing well. Perhaps it would be good if you were to visit her soon?”

  “Nonsense,” Salah replied, “She told me she was, God willing, feeling better when last I spoke to her.”

  “Perhaps you are right,” Ali looked away, deferentially. “However, I think she would like to see you.”

  “ Inshallah. God willing,” Salah said automatically. With a casual turn of the head, he dismissed his son and returned to conversing with the two men at the table. Ali, resigned to his father’s nonchalance, walked out of the cafe into the afternoon air. Perhaps he would visit her after all...one never knew the whims of that man. It had taken a concerted effort on the part of his older brothers to keep the hanut from permanently closing shop. Salah’s passions were enjoying life and spending time with his friends; his family and his work had always come second.

  Ali walked for a while, contemplating his father’s negligence. Eventually he came to a bench located in a small, unkempt park off the main boulevard. Several children were running back and forth across the dirt path, attempting to lift homemade kites into the air with little success; there simply wasn’t enough wind today. Ali sat down, took out his laptop from his backpack and began to write.

  What have our parents taught us: That it is appropriate to accept the governance of the flawed, that stolid, pragmatic conservatism is preferable to innovation, that the ways of our grandfathers and grandmothers was always as such?

  It is not true! It is all a lie. I choose not to believe in their teachings. The Holy Quran, as recorded by our estimable prophet, peace be upon him, says this: "When they are told to follow what Allah has revealed, they say: ‘Nay we shall follow the ways that we found our fathers following!' What! Even if it is Satan beckoning them to the penalty of the blazing fire? "

  I do not wish to burn in the fires of this Hell, brothers and sisters. For if there is a hell on earth it is the stubborn intransigence of the generations before. I will not be blinded by those who will not open their eyes to see, I will not be deafened by those unwilling to hear the word. False stories and fairytales are not worthy of our devotion. Let us instead craft an Eden here in this time, for the glory of God. Let us govern ourselves fairly, impartially. Let us educate our children in the higher mathematics, in the sciences that we have uncovered.

  A great astronomer once said, “I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. I agree entirely.

  Ali scanned his blog post for grammatical errors and, after making a few corrections, clicked the submit button. Closing the laptop, he trudged home to check in on his mother. He would text Amina later to see if she wanted to have some coffee in one of the upscale establishments near her work.

  Chapter 3

  643 CE, Cyrene, North Africa

  The sky was a brilliant blue as the army of the faithful arrayed themselves in several echelons opposite the Byzantine conscripts. Green, black, and white pennants, the colors of the Ummayids, swayed in the gentle breeze. 40,000 infantry, armed with cruel iron spears, swift curving blades, and others with bows of bone and sinew. 5,000 mounted cavalrymen, their armor gleaming scale and rich coats of leather, capped bronze helmets expertly forged in the fires of Medina and Damascus. Imams traveled up and down the lines, speaking words of encouragement to the swarthy men who had come here to enlighten the uneducated, the ignorant Rum.

  Across the trackless, fallow field stood the Christian Byzantines: 7,000 in all. It was an army composed mostly of farmers and peasants. Splintered wooden spears stood alongside pitchforks and hoes, the standing men garbed in cotton shirts and rusted mail. What banners there were amongst their lines displayed the Chi Rho and the Holy Cross in faded blues and reds. Despite their appearance, these were hard men. They’d seen a multitude of troubles in their time, and this was their home, though their city, Cyrene, had seen its golden age long past.

  Some few cataphracts there were amongst the Greeks, and these were well armed and armored, having come by sea in haste from Byzantium. Armored knights in scale-mail wielded their much feared kontos lances, each four meters long, the tips deadly sharp and capable of skewering a man in one swift blow. Their captain was renowned, a veteran of conflicts past. Giannikas was his surname, though his men called him the Wolf, for he was cunning and fast, a predator on the battlefield.

  As the Greek soldiers watched across the field, by some unseen signal the Ummayid army as one faced eastward and knelt; the cavalry dismounted too, and their noble figures merged into the mass of prostrating figures. A lone voice carried on the wind the adhan, the call to prayer. The muezzin’s voice was warm and sonorous, and his words lifted the hearts of the Muslims.

  “God is great. God is great. There is no God but God, and Mohammed is his Prophet.”

  The Greek army, wary of this alien custom, began to chatter and talk as they witnessed the spectacle of the enemy bowing in unison. Some priests among them administered communion and spoke derisively of these heathens and their barbaric ways. “These are not Christian men!” they called, and admonished the men of Cyrene to slaughter the foreigners in the name of their Lord and the Emperor.

  Soon thereafter, the Arab army arrayed themselves again facing the Byzantines. Horns sounded and the multitude advanced towards the Greek lines, pennants and standards bobbing and swaying as the men marched. The Bedouin cavalry as one trotted to the left flank of the Ummayid lines, keeping to the southern slope of a hill and thus remaining out of sight of the Greeks. One Byzantine archer, a farmer whose given name was John, was the first to let loose a white-feathered arrow, its shaft hewn from good cypress. The missile whistled as it flew upwards and fell back down into the invaders’ lines, its iron tip striking a dark eyed spearman in the shoulder who screamed as he fell to the ground. A hundred more arrows soon followed, and the Ummayid men raised their embossed, circular shields skyward for protection. Arab archers began to return volleys of fire as they moved to the rear of the Ummayid formation. Advance. Stop. Draw. Fire. Advance.

  As the lines closed, the difference in size between the two armies became readily apparent. The Arab formation like a crescent moon slowly began to encircle the Byzantines. Archers on both sides retreated as the waves of armored swordsmen and spearmen slammed into one another with a deafening clash. Screaming the names of their God, each army meted out vicious blows with sharpened metal. Suddenly, with a terrible cry the mounted Greek cataphracts, flashing scale armor blinding in the noonday sun pierced the Ummayid army’s western echelon, attempting to break out of the enveloping swell of their enemy. Men were trampled wholesale underfoot as the chargers thrust full gallop into the Ummayid lines. The cataphracts’ kontos lances skewered infantrymen as the professional Greek cavalry, well practiced in this ancient art of warfare, pushed onwards, led by their wolfish captain.

  With a howling likened to a thousand djinn, the Arab cavalry, unseen until that moment, counter-charged the Byzantine knights. African horses bucked and whinnied as spears and long scimitars slashed their sides; many of their riders dismounted or hacked down in the fray. The Greek lines, already exhausted as they fought, rippled with desperation upon seeing their valiant knights overwhelmed.

  It was all over rather quickly. Forty minutes after the battle had begun the Byzantine conscripts’ line
s broke and fled to the city, pursued by the victorious Arab army. Most of the Greek fighters were captured, for such were the orders of the Ummayid general. “Submit, or die,” were his terms. In this, he was merciful, for in truth he did not want these lands or its wealth for himself; rather, he sought the conversion of its people to Islam. He fought, as he always did, to save these people from themselves.

  Some Byzantine men and their families would not convert and attempted to escape the city under the cover of the evening darkness, heading north to the sea. Others took their own lives rather than abandon their deeply held Christian faith. Many more sought merely to pay lip service to conversion and would practice as Christians in secret, hiding their holy icons and imagery from their conquerors. Assimilation would take time the general reasoned, correctly. And though the Ummayid army would move on, a garrison would be left behind in Cyrene to ensure the true faith was kept: that the salat be undertaken five times a day, that the zakat be given to the poor and needy. Thus it was with all the caliphate’s new lands, for all eternity if Allah willed it.

  ****

  Todd arrived home to his one story ranch house in Palm Bay after he submitted his resignation notice on a Friday. He had been dreading quitting; his career after grad school had begun at NASA and he had both respected and admired his colleagues there. His supervisors had taught him a great deal, about aerospace engineering, robotics, the higher sciences, but also about navigating a bloated bureaucracy that sometimes didn’t give you what you needed to flourish. Oftentimes over the years, as he climbed the agency’s corporate ladder and began managing mission teams of his own, it was this morass of intransigent politicians, lobbyists, petty bureaucrats, and private interest groups that proved the greatest impediment to success. Quitting felt like letting down his friends, his team; Todd didn’t like to disappoint people. Still, it had all been worth it, the years of effort, that sense of accomplishment when you landed a piece of humanity, even if it was just a machine, on an alien world.

  Anne was standing by the kitchen counter scooping some kibble into Thor’s dinner bowl. A bottle of cabernet with a blue and white “Congratulations!” balloon tied to its neck, purchased from the supermarket, stood on the table. The balloon bobbed up and down from the current generated by the ancient air conditioner that hung in the nearby window.

  “Hey beautiful,” Todd nodded at the bottle. “You didn’t have to go through the trouble.”

  “Oh it wasn’t any trouble at all.” Anne was beautiful, more beautiful now in her late thirties than when he’d met her at twenty-seven. She wore a floral print sundress and her hair was dyed dark red, almost cinnamon, from henna; a habit she’d picked up whilst living in Africa. The color complimented her eyes, which were a greenish-grey; their pigment seemed to shift with her mood.

  Todd kissed her on the cheek. “Well it was thoughtful of you, regardless.” He began sorting through the mail that was piled on the counter. Thor, their belligerent beagle of seven years, marched over to his meal and began to scarf it down. “Want me to make dinner?”

  Anne shook her head. “Nope! I made your favorite, spaghetti with meatballs from the co-op.”

  “You cooked?” Todd was shocked. Anne hated cooking. How she survived the Peace Corps when she could barely make toast was still beyond his understanding.

  “The occasion seemed to warrant a special effort. And besides,” she nudged him as she delivered the dish of noodles to the table in the living room. “Spaghetti isn’t rocket science.”

  The joke was anathema to anyone who worked for NASA, but he let it slide this time. They would be moving in less than a week, with most of their possessions going into storage or to Anne’s grandmother’s place in Pennsylvania. Todd sat down to eat dinner at the table with his wife, leaving his tablet and smartphone in the den; there was a strictly enforced “no electronics” policy at the dinner table.

  “How’s your Arabic coming along?” Anne asked, between mouthfuls of spaghetti.

  “So-so.” Todd replied. “I haven’t really had time to listen to those podcast lessons. But I do remember how to say hello and thank you. ‘Ahlan.’ ‘Shokron.’ How about you?”

  “Ummm, I’ve been focusing on planning my sabbatical.” Anne had requested a year’s leave of absence in order to follow Todd to the Gulf. She’d be guest lecturing at a few of the well-established biotech schools in the region, in addition to surveying the native desert flora with colleagues from some of the local universities. She’d set it all up so fast, like she’d been planning to do it before Todd had even gotten the offer from Al-Hatem.

  Todd guffawed. “Hah. All right. Well, from what I’m told there are a lot of westerners working in the UAE; English is becoming the lingua franca of the region, so we should be all right starting out. Oh, I got my work visa yesterday, too.”

  Anne nodded at him. “You know they rely on a lot of imported labor from South Asia. Have you read about that? Some say it’s just slave labor wrapped up in bunting.”

  “Yeah, but Al-Hatem is all high-skilled labor. There’s no brick-laying or dirt tilling there.”

  “If you say so.”

  After dinner, Todd continued the monumental task of packing his entire life into two footlockers and a carry-on backpack. He’d been told that the apartment at the complex they’d be living in was fully furnished with all the necessaries: a bed, linens, silverware, cooking implements, furniture, etc. Todd only really needed his clothes, his books, and his electronics. Anne and he were shipping what few household ornaments they valued.

  An hour and a half into the folding, the sorting, and the parsing of his life, a strange feeling came over Todd. It had little to do with the packing and boxing. Rather, it felt as though he were being watched, as if from a distance. He looked up from his spot on the floor of the bedroom where he was filling a lockbox with photos and sentimental trinkets. It was an absurd notion; the curtains were closed, there was nobody else in the room. Thor and Anne were down the hall. Still, the feeling didn’t go away, and he grew strangely nervous, unable to focus on the task at hand. Getting up from the floor, Todd decided he needed a break. He went to the back door of the house and stepped out onto the deck. A few of the neighbors were grilling, and the smell of hamburgers wafted over from the adjacent yard. The salty breeze that rolled in off the ocean a mile distant calmed him; it was a typical summer evening. I’m just stressed from the move, is all, Todd thought.

  He watched the sun drop below the horizon of picketed fences and mundane, Floridian suburbia. Anne came and stood with him shoulder to shoulder, a glass of red wine in her hand.

  The night air washed away the sticky humidity of the day, and a throng of fireflies blinked on and off in the sky above the grassy yard. It was entrancing, the tiny flashes of lime yellows and iridescent greens, no set pattern, just minute chaos and unintelligible, alien communication. They walked back inside, abandoning, for now, the boxes and packing for the pleasure of one another’s company.

  ****

  “Ali you dumb shit!” his brother Abdel screamed at him through his cellphone. “Where are you? What have you done? You’ll kill our poor mother!” Ali, sitting outside the library, held the phone at arm’s length, face drained of all color. He was sure the phone’s speakers would bust from his brother’s outburst. After a few more expletives, the tirade slowed, his brother expecting a response.

  “I don’t know what you mean, Abdel. I haven’t done anything. Mother is at home, in bed.” Ali looked around, but none of the sidewalk pedestrians paid him any attention, intent on their afternoon trips to the souq or to the market. He had been writing a freelance article on the history of the most recent Syrian conflict when his brother had called.

  “You stupid ass. Your blog is being discussed on Tunisia Today!”

  Ali’s stomach churned, and he suddenly felt like he was going to throw up. Tunisia Today was the most watched show in the city. Why would a dumb talk show that covered politicians’ petty ineptitudes and the affair
s of national newsmakers be discussing his blog? His mind began racing as his brother continued to squawk at him over the phone. Had he revealed any personal information in his posts? Anything that could lead the more prominent religious figures, some of the senior imams, to condemn his family? His brothers and friends knew about the blog, Amina too, but no one at his former place of employment. “Brother, I’ve got to go. I’ll see you soon, Inshallah.” Ali interrupted his brother mid-sentence and quickly ended the call. He began walking at a rapid pace to the nearest cafe, somewhere where he could ask an employee to tune in the shop’s television to Tunisia Today. Both fortunately and unfortunately for Ali, it was likely that numerous cafes already had it playing.

  There, at a small, dingy establishment, the ‘Cafe Sahara’ only two blocks from the library, was a TV visible in the window, already displaying the program. Ali entered and sat down, signaling by hand gesture to the waiter for an espresso. Three commentators sat around a table, two middle aged men in western suits and one older Haji wearing the distinct uniform of an Islamic cleric. The program title beneath the talking-heads read: ‘Degeneration of Tunisia?’ in bold, yellow script. Ali swallowed nervously and asked for the volume to be turned up.

  “...What I am saying is, these types of websites are dangerous to our youth. Already the children spend too much time indoors on the internet, not enough time praying or studying, or getting exercise,” said the Imam. One of the suited men was nodding vehemently in agreement. “Aside from the fact that this is heresy; antithetical to the teachings of the Prophet, blessings be upon him, it is a misappropriation of the words of the Holy Quran; it is not Sunnah.”